A Life of Crime
by ntlpurpolia
Summary: "Thalia wasn't supposed to meet Nico. She wasn't supposed to fall in love. She wasn't supposed to want to stay. / She was supposed to get in, get out, and be back to New York before anyone knew she'd left. But then again, her life was never as expected." Modern-Day AU, AH, Thalico. Spy!Thalia and Ex-Drug-Addict!Nico. Background Jasper and Percabeth. BEING REWRITTEN LATER!
1. I

**So, this is a new story, because I totally need something to forget to update. Enjoy!**

* * *

 ** _"Time to listen to my confession / I'm much less than I wanted to be"_ -Lock me up, The Cab**

:::

Ever since she could remember, Thalia Grace had been a spy. ( _Life of crime- now with **literal meaning**!) _ It wasn't that she _wanted_ to be one or anything... It was the family business. Her first mission had been when she was five- of course, she hadn't known it then. It took place at the candy store...

 _Steven and Chris, two of her dad's employees had been with her. They were her babysitters back then, honorary uncles. They were also brothers._

 _"So, you want the blue Smarties, doncha?" Chris said, crouching down to meet her eye, careful to avoid knocking over a display of gummy bears._

 _"Yep," Thalia responded earnestly, nodding, all doe-eyed._

 _"You see that lady over there?" Steven asks, pointing at an unfortunate woman, who had the day before, been in the wrong place during the wrong time._

 _"Yeah..." She rocked back and forth on her heels as she spoke, impatient. She wanted candy!_

 _"Well, if you go up to her and tell her you can't find your mommy, I will buy you all the blue Smarties you want." Chris proposed._

 _The little girl put her hand on her chin, clearly mulling it over. She frowned. " But that's **lying,** and when I lied about brushing my teeth last month you said it was **bad**."_

 _"It was only bad because you didn't brush your teeth, Thalia. Not because you lied," Steve told her, gritting his teeth. Hades, he hated his job._

 _"So I can tell_ ** _all the lies I want?"_** _The raven-haired girl's eyes widened, electric blue depths expansive, endless. "Okay!"_

 _"Excuse me, ma'am but I can't find my mommy..."_

:::

Now, Thalia sat in front of the impressive, ornately carved walnut desk that was her father's, waiting for him to finish getting his coffee. Thalia almost feels like propping her feet up on the tabletop, which is strewn with documents and pens and a half-empty coffee mug or two, just for a sense of good old teenage rebellion from when she was obsessed with punk rock. She still is, but no longer feels the need to flaunt it in her hairstyle or clothes.

"You're going to Venice," Her father barges in suddenly, no _sorry i'm late_ or any such lead-in.

"For a vacation, or is there some ulterior motive you're referring to?" Thalia raises an eyebrow, abruptly feeling like she _should_ put her four-inch-Manolo-clad-feet onto his desk, just to piss him off further. They always settle back into this routine, it seems, this push and pull of _ticked off_ and _i need you back to do this_.

"Don't be a smart-ass, Thalia. I didn't raise you that way."

She bites back the _you didn't raise me at all_ as he continues, "There's a mole in the company, and they're taking money, killing our agents. I have someone tracking the Monte Carlo branch and you're doing the Venice one."

Thalia perks up immediately at the sound of a mission. "When do I leave?"

"Tomorrow. The suspect needs to be someone influential, so you're on the guest list of every major gala that's taking place there."

"What, Venetian high society?" She suppresses a snort at the thought.

"No, _American_ elite in Venice. New York, people like that."

"Red-eye flight?"

"Yes, but you get the company jet."

Oh, well. Comfortable trip there.

She just doesn't know if the mission will be anywhere near that comfort level.

:::

The pilot, Charlie, whom has been employed by her father since she was young asks, "You nervous?" But with his thick Boston accent it sounded more like _neh-vous_.

"No. They are all the same, anyways. Go there, do whatever I have to, get out."

"And then happily ever after," He replies sardonically ( _he has been here too long to think it'll be anything but tragic)_ before continuing, "But I meant are you nervous about _flying_."

 _Oh._ "You know that answer."

"Still, I keep hoping it'll change."

"Don't bother. We both know it won't," she told him, fighting back a yawn. No matter what the adrenaline from nerves said, it was still three in the morning.

"Don't be so sure." The words were accompanied by a chuckle. Thalia put her earbuds in and let Linkin Park blast out her fears- or at least try to. She pulled out a book, finished it, amused herself with _Instyle_ and _People_ and _Faux_ magazine, bored herself to death with love lives and scandals and people whose biggest problems were what to wear.

( _There were exact moments when she wished they were her life and others when she acted like they were. Most of the time, they overlapped.)_

:::

She has to stop in London, transfer to Venice, then take a boat ride to the hotel. Boats make her only slightly less nauseous than planes, so this trip is off to one of the worst starts. Ever. Thalia makes it, though, and tips the guy driving the boat a hefty sum (the way her father would). By the time she's in her room she is grateful for the leggings and zip-up hoodie she always wears on planes- even ones with leather seats and orange juice served in champagne glasses- because _crash_ doesn't even begin to define what she wants to do.

It's two hours later that Thalia wakes up, jet lag pulling her from slumber. A change of clothes and nice shower are on the to-do list to making her vaguely presentable. After she finishes changing into a black slip dress featuring inch-wide straps and a fluted hem with burgundy cork-soled wedges, hair wet because blow-drying is such a waste of time, Thalia ventures out. She only makes it to the edge of a canal with stone steps leading into the water, which clearly used to be white but now are splotched with rust and ruin, wear and tear, flotsam and jetsam.

 _(who used these steps,_ the poet in her wonders, _a mermaid?_ )

Some small, childish part of her wants to be a mermaid at that very moment, hiding in the water, tipping gondolas to scare the tourists, giggling with some other sea-creature, coming up at dusk and slinking back into the ocean at night. It sounds a helluva good time, a lot more fun than going on this mission, this death sentence for everyone that isn't her- on the outside.

She stands there for a while, before moving on to a garden enclosed with a gate, full of statues and plants ( _a zoo for things that don`t move_ ) but eventually makes her way back to the canal, which has become occupied since she left it, by a guy her age holding a cigarette.

"Care for a smoke?" asks the guy, with only a trace of lilting Italian accent. Surprising.

She takes the proffered cigarette as an invitation to sit, settling down beside him and tugging the linen of her dress over her knees.

Thalia receives the cigarette with a nod and a rueful "Trying to quit, though."

"Aren't we all." He laughs, a dark laugh, the sound like a trapped butterfly rarely released, or an exotic hummingbird in a gilded cage."You look like you've been clean for a while, though."

"I just smoke after long flights. Takes the edge off."

"Ah." The word is accompanied by another drag, pale smoke curling out like a white flag, surrender to this toxic, lethal drug. But then, to steal his words, aren't they all? (toxic and lethal, that is.)

Thalia blows out smoke, watches it drift over the sunset-hued water, tinted peach and coral and lilac. If she squints, the smoke is a cloud and the boy next to her, someone she might lean over to kiss playfully, tenderly. And if her vision blurs enough, she is a schoolgirl on vacation and this is a summer fling.

They are two strangers smoking, and she won't tell a fairy-tale-rom-com-flavoured lie to say that this is love at first sight, but the atmosphere is galvanic, electric the way novels talk about kisses. Like them killing themselves slowly is more intimate than any touch. And it is, isn't it? After all, she's kissed dozens of people where it hasn't counted, all for purposes- _wants_ not her own.

( _and that's why you should leave,_ says the little voice in her head, _because love is a distraction at best and always, **always**_ _bad for you.)_


	2. II

" ** _Fools fall in love just like schoolgirls_** " ** _\- Elvis Presley, Fools_**

* * *

 _He was there again._

 _Luke. He was always there, the ghost of him haunting her and asking why she didn't save him. She'll tell him she didn't couldn't that it was impossible and then it becomes impossible because her excuses choke her. He'll shove her, and she'll fall out into the endless blue sky, the place where there is nowhere to hide..._

Thalia wakes with his name in her mouth and her own scream still ringing in her ears and _smoke,_ pungent and choking and demanding so much from her: oxygen, balance, consciousness. Shaking her head, she mentally curses; _dammit_ , there's smoke in the air, and an alarm buzzing. The room is dark with nighttime, the moonlight barred by the heavy drapes. _Think,_ years of training tell her. _What's the threat and what should you do?_ There's fire. She's running.

"Could all guests please vacate the building at this time. Our staff will guide you to the nearest exit. Do _not_ take the elevator and please remain calm. Thank you for your cooperation." The message repeats, the voice on the intercom a dull, meaningless drone that was first Italian then English, but she knows both.

Throughout the entire duration of the vacating, throughout the monotone of walking through hallways and down stairs and following exit signs, Thalia's mind refuses to listen to her ( _look at you, **her father's voice says,** can't even control your own head_ ) her thoughts keep flashing back to that guy she had a smoke with the day before yesterday, won't stop wondering where he is now even though he might not even be a guest or staff of the hotel, even though doing pointless things isn't her style. Some small sensible fraction of her mind, which is untainted by the osmosis-like thoughts, chalks it up to sleep deprivation, tells herself that the red-and-gold fleur-de-lis carpet is the most interesting thing in the world.

 **(~xoXox~)**

* * *

 _Christ,_ it's cold. The weather in middle-of-the-night-Venice nips at her nose, sinks beneath her clothes beneath her skin, and the thought of skin makes her think of Smoking Guy, wonder how his touch would feel against hers. Her eyes scan the shivering crowd out here with her before they realize what she's doing -and what is she doing? There's no one out here to look for, and it should stay that way.

"Can I offer you a blanket, miss?" Someone with a familiar voice, deep and soothing (like chenille and satin all mixed together) asks her.

"Yes, thank you." She turns, and oh, her heart is traitorous in its tripping-over-itself, her mind reacting without her will to flash back to the cigarette-smoking steps by the canal, when she says Smoking Guy. So he _works_ here, and her heart betrays her again when he meets her fevered gaze with a level one, no sign at all that they are anything, and her heart aches. But that is for the best, so why does her heart leap when he brushes by her, shoulder against shoulder?

"Anytime," he says, disappearing into the shadows to leave her emotions waging World War III on each other. _Damn,_ he's hot.

 **(~xoXox~)**

The sunlight waltzes in through the slit of the drapes, not caring that she's only had five hours of sleep, or that it's giving her a hungover feeling. Before she can even muster the energy to get out of bed- or, rather, topple to the floor and lie there for some time before getting off of it, there is a knock at the door. She throws on a dark grey zip-up hoodie over her pajamas, then looks through the peephole. The head is blonde, and for a second she thinks it's Luke, and her heart breaks and leaps simultaneously, but no, it's an even more unlikely character: Jason.

Thalia is unsure of how the door swung open or her brother entered, but all she knows is that she is in his arms, engulfed by the clean scent of him: books and linen and something sharp that stung her nose. He has glasses now, gold-rimmed things that make him look older, but they don't fool her; to her he is always her baby brother, the one she protected and loved and cared for. _Still_ protects and loves and cares for.

"What are you doing here, Jase?" She asks him, not demanding, exactly, but still curious. He never just shows up like this; in fact, she's barely seen him since he got accepted into Princeton and moved there. Hard to blame him, though, when she is so deeply intertwined in their father's business, their father's toxic, dangerous business.

"I came to see how you were doing," He tells her, and she doesn't believe him.

"Now, and not a thousand other times, a thousand other missions? You're funny." Thalia says dryly, raising an eyebrow.

He sighs. Her brother has always been an honest man, unlike her, and so he replies, "I came to tell you I won't be home for Thanksgiving." _Again._

"So I ought to go home and break Father's heart once again? Can't you tell him yourself? Not in person, but there is this lovely thing called technology," She walks over to the closet as she speaks, rifling through the clothes. Jason joins her, then holds a hand to his nose, coughing.

"You're not smoking again, are you?" He frowns, disapprovingly, and then his eyes look so incredibly like their father's, save for the colour- Zeus Grace's eyes were steel grey. Storm grey.

"Would it matter if I was? You're not my keeper, you know," she comments, nonchalant.

"You're going to kill yourself." A vigorous head-shaking, enough to give her whiplash just looking at him.

"It was _one smoke_ , Jason. I'm not going to die of cancer from one frickin' cigarette. I was just stressed after the flight, and someone offered me a smoke, so I took it. You know what? I shouldn't have to explain myself. You're not my father, I already have one too many. Why don't you just go back to Princeton, and stay far away from me and our twisted family, and we'll all be better off."

"Thalia," He reaches for her, but his tone contains a trace of patronizing, the way one might talk to a small, upset toddler, so she twists away, eel-like. "Thalia, you're upset, you don't mean that-"

"I do! Don't talk to me like that, not like you're our father-"

The tension breaks. And Jason leaves, hurt hurt hurt welling in his eyes, hurt hurt hurt pouring into her heart.

She turns away.

 **(~xoXox~)**

* * *

"I think you've lost your mind," booms Zeus Grace from over the phone, and Thalia winces. Even over the phone, her father has the voice of a trumpeting elephant.

"What?" As usual, the two of them might as well speak different languages.

"How has it taken you so long? It should be a week's mission, tops." That's true. But she likes it here, likes the peacefulness, the sights, the... people.

"You didn't give me much to work with." She snaps, irritated.

"You've had a lot of experience with less than this."

"Well, I came early. Nothing's started so I can't meet anyone... possibly responsible."

"Fine, fine." He makes an exasperated sound and she can picture him running his fingers through his hair. "Make sure to be at the airport by twelve this Saturday. I booked you a flight back for the Thanksgiving family dinner."

Now she's exasperated. "Okay. _Bye._ "

The phone smacks into its cradle, the thud nearly masked by the sigh she huffs out as she sits on the bed, resting her head in her hands.

 _(Fade to black_ )( _this could be how your movie ends if you want it to be_ )

* * *

 **Please review!**


	3. III

_**"No one ever listens / This wallpaper glistens / Don't let them see what goes on in the kitchen"**_ **- _Dollhouse, Melanie Martinez_**

* * *

Thalia sees _him_ (Smoking Guy) several more times before she leaves for Vancouver for Thanksgiving, and always sees him at the steps by the canal where they first met a week earlier. Since then, myriad ferries, gondola, and even a (fake) pirate ship have floated by them. And on one such rendezvous, she manages to pry his name out of him- but not without giving away her own first.

"I'm Thalia. Thalia Grace." The introduction falls out of her mouth after he has finished telling her about a particularly rude customer with a rather large posterior. He told her because she had earlier informed him that he looked most terribly cimmerian and that misery loved company. He had laughed, the same chuckle that she had heard when she told him she was trying to quit smoking- the one that now gives her a visual of red wine (not Burgundy, too offbeat to be Burgundy, and certainly not a rose wine- he was Merlot) the sound of his laugh a splash of Merlot.

Then he had begun the tale. And suddenly, with the easy anonymity of their conversations, she had blurted out her name (nothing about them is conventional) and she still cannot figure out _why_. It could be anything- the staleness of anonymity; curiosity... all she knows is that she does not regret it, and has no idea where to go from here.

"Nico di Angelo."

 _Of the angels_. A fallen one, maybe. "Can I..." Thalia swallows, this question as daunting as any mission; regret is a coiled viper waiting to strike. "Can I have your number?"

His skin is alabaster, his eyes obsidian, expression the serene blankness of a statue's as he says, "Sure."

That entire conversation was a mistake. (But so was coming here, being born, ever doing a single mission.)

 **~xXx~**

Family. Definition: A screwed-up group of blood-related people who get together every once in a while.

That was why she was here in the lobby of this sumptuously decorated Vancouver hotel featuring an ornate gold-decorated white Christmas tree, which stood out from the rest of the area's neutral, muted warm tones: all amber and ocher, comfortable chairs grouped with dying-to-be-sunk-into ottomans all around the room. Thalia marched up to the elevators, having been here many times. The restaurant, MARKET, had to have been chosen by one of her father's brothers, who had slightly more modern tastes than his old-money, royalty sense of style. A _ding!_ alerted her to an empty elevator and she hefted her tote bag further over her shoulder and walked in, pressing the fifth floor button.

Upon arriving at the restaurant, she ignored both the PLEASE WAIT TO BE SEATED sign and long queue, strolling towards the usual table where she saw her "relatives" seated at a long side table with white booths and pale wood minimalist chairs.

The supper was typical- or, at least what _passed for_ typical in her atypical family. First course of pear and endive salad with a side of gossip. Next it would be caramelized cauliflower and seared scallops alongside more scandals and a lead-in to rants about their children's failures, followed by Nova Scotia lobster with truffle mashed potatoes and complaints about their offspring that they paid no attention to until Christmas. Finally dessert would be served: a creme brulee with strawberries and plans for the weekend.

"So, Thalia, where is your brother?" Her father asks, usually in what would be coarser language and an angrier tone, but _they are in public_ and _he cannot possibly let their relatives know of their private drama._ "It is not like him to be late." The _u_ _nlike you_ is implied.

"He showed up in Venice and told me he could not make it. "

"Oh?" Her aunt Athena asks. "What were you doing in Venice?"

"Just a vacation. You know, poking around art museums and things like that." The answer seems to ply her aunt- Athena, that is.

"Oh, I love Venice! It's almost as romantic as Paris." Aunt Aphrodite exclaims, as her daughter Silena sighs.

Thalia is fairly certain she hears Aphrodite's husband, Ares, grumble under his breath, "You say that about everything."

She can't say she disagrees.

 **~xXx~**

"I think this dress would look nice on you, " Her aunt held up a black Mango shirt-dress with buttons and a tie around the waist. The three of them (Annabeth, Aphrodite, and Thalia) were on the famous Barcelona Shopping Line.

"So, I heard you have a crush, " Annabeth comments discreetly to her friend whilst Aphrodite is out of earshot.

"What are you talking about?" Thalia wants her friend to be wrong, because- she has said it before, but to her it is well worth repeating, her mantra - emotions are dangerous.

"You have that look. Like you are a million miles away and a guy brought you there, " Her friend wiggles her blonde, well-plucked brows in a poor imitation of someone much more lewd.

"No, no! It's just another mission, is all. Anyways, let's not talk about me, how about you and Percy?"

Annabeth squeals, so out of character Thalia has to rub her eyes and take a closer look at her friend, who says, "He proposed!"

Her words line her rib cage with barbed wire, so that every heartbeat hurts.

* * *

The bathroom walls echo with her sobs, loud at first and then silent, but her ears still ring, head still throbs.

Thalia feels like dying.

Her best friend is engaged to the love of her life and Thalia can't even feel happy for her because that is how screwed up she is. Screwed-up and selfish and so damn broken and _why can't she get out?_

 _But wait,_ the self-destruct part of her mind says, _there is a gun in your purse and it has a trigger and if you put it to your head and pull the trigger, you can get out. Don't you want to not exist?_

She pulls at the zipper of her bag, going to retrieve something, anything. Pills, cigarettes, escape... The memories taunt her: _disappear, get high, ignore everything, run away..._ But she isn't that person anymore. Has to have some redemption, at least, so she _can't_ be that person anymore.

Just then, her phone rings. Hedley's It's Never Too Late's opening lines is the ringtone, which means it's Nico calling. Her fingers tremble -with excitement or something darker, richer, more passionate?- and she nearly drops the phone into the toilet. Thalia swipes ANSWER and moves out of the dingy bathroom stall.

"Hey," he says, and she presses the phone closer to her ear, wanting to feel the warmth of his voice even from God knows how far away.

"Hi," but it's a mistake, speaking, because her voice is still a rasp from crying.

"What's up?"

And because he makes her tell the truth, makes her do things she (might-slash-will) regret, she tells him, "I want to kill myself."

"I do that all the time." Just like that. No _there are 1-800 hotlines for that_ or awkward silence, but this... it hurts, the truth does, and the truth is that they're both more screwed up under the surface than they seem.

"Okay." There is noise in the background beyond his voice, nothing like Venice. Someone speaks, not in Italian but Spanish...? "Where are you?"

"Barcelona, visiting my aunt. Why?"

She laughs, _such a small world_ coming to mind, all thoughts of suicide banished, and she carefully sets her phone on the counter to splash cold water on her face, redo her eyeliner before picking it up again. "You still there?"

"Oh, good. Yes."

"Why did you call?"

"I missed... having someone to talk to."

He is so open it breaks her heart. She takes on a flirty tone, tries to keep her heart in check, says "And not me?"

"Isn't that what I said?"

"I'm in Barcelona, too. Do you want to... meet up, or something like that?"

"Love to. Where?"

She gives him her address, hopes she doesn't regret it, knows she will.


	4. IV

_**"I slept in yesterday's clothes / And tomorrow's dreams / But they're not quite what they seem ... / bury me til I confess" - Uma Thurman, Fall Out Boy**_

* * *

The fair-haired man pushed the ski mask firmly over his face as he punched the twelve-character code into the keypad, smiling a vicious, gleeful grin at the thought of what he was about to do.

Up above, a man in the control room turned on his earpiece, whispering, "The coast is clear, sir. The security detail has been taken care of. "

"And the surveillance cameras?" There was a very good chance that he would not be recognized I his ski mask and black suit -poached from the espionage unit of this company with no suspicion at all, because he was well-esteemed among the Grace enterprises- but the blonde did not wish to take any chances.

"All disabled from the foyer to the file room, sir. "

"Thank you, Winston. I shall be on my way now."

Creeping up and taking the elevator from the foyer to yet another set of steel and titanium doors accompanied by a keypad, he entered yet another code and found a long corridor. As he walked down the familiar passageway towards the most secure space in the entire building, he contemplated his mission, questioning it for not the first time. _It's all for Thalia, he told himself. All for her._

He was still telling himself that when he hacked into the computer system and deleted every file that was on the database and downloaded all of it onto his hard drive.

 **~xXx~**

He's drunk again.

Zeus.

This isn't surprising; Thalia has always known and hated that she is like her father, all emotion like a lightning bolt waiting to strike. They are both hotheads, impossible to reason with, quick to anger, quick to getting into stupid situations ( _like this one._ )

Every time he gets drunk she is forced to endure his maudlin rambling and this is no different.

It's the anniversary of the day her mother died in a fiery car crash three years ago. WIFE OF OIL TYCOON ZEUS GRACE, BERYL GRACE, DIES IN DRUNK DRIVING ACCIDENT the headlines blared. Thalia's never missed her, never seen what her father had and still does in her mother. It was never enough though; he's never loved Beryl Grace enough to do anything but marry her, knock her up twice, and cheat on her twenty-four seven. That was what drove her to crash, drove her to drink, drove her to get in the Maserati (that year's Valentine's Day present along with a seventy five carat diamond ring) and rev the engine from zero to two hundred in a matter of seconds.

He did love his wife though, in their family's screwed up way of loving people. Love is what drives him to drink, cry, show emotion rare as the pink diamond earrings that he bought for his wife on her birthday one year. (The ones she died wearing flashes in her mind, that memory fresh as it was that grey December morning- it was the only headline that made the Macy's Thanksgiving parade insignificant.)

"I don't know why I do this." Zeus is dead drunk, drunk as a skunk, as intoxicated as ever. If he had a stroke she wouldn't be able to tell the difference. If he had a stroke she wouldn't care. If _she_ had a stroke she wouldn't care. "I don't know why I get drunk every year over your goddamn _whore_ of a mother. Heartless bitch."

At the end, before she killed herself, Beryl Grace was practically a teetotaler. Like she was saving all the alcohol for the main event, for the going-out-with-a-bang moment. Thalia had been twenty-four and seen it coming, had been drinking with Luke when it happened, had ordered champagne when she read about the accident on her phone. They had toasted. She doesn't know why she thinks about Luke now, why she thinks about their glory days, young and dumb and headed nowhere too fast. Their relationship, their lives, all going downhill while they were intertwined.

Zeus vomits into the trash can in his office. She can't decide if the smell is better or worse than the alcohol coming off his breath. The room is redolent with liquor and bodily fluids. "Don't you dare even think about doing anything she did. I raised you better than that. I raised you to be like me."

(I'm already like you though and there's nothing I can do about it takes a stroll through her head, only it's going in circles and never leaves). He's said this speech a thousand times, so she knows all the words to this song and just nods like he's saying important things that she's hearing for the first time, tries to calculate how long it'll take for him to be piss drunk and fall asleep, like the guy under the table with the lute in Disney's Sleeping Beauty.

"Go on, get out."

He's offering her a miraculous reprieve, but as she leaves, weary and heavy with disappointments that are not her own, she can't help but turn around and feel sad for her father. Even though none of it is her fault and her parents are two people who should never have gotten married or had children in the first place. Gods, Jason, why can't he be where he should be, with her watching their dad get drunk? Though she still can't blame him, she wishes for once she could give someone else this burden.

His words have filled her with lead instead of bones, so the way she usually goes to her hotel room (taking the stairs so the pain stops her from thinking) is too much and she jabs the elevator button instead and steps into the richly upholstered lift.

This is my life, she thinks, in the lap of luxury and going nowhere but down...


	5. V

_**"And I, I think you're from another world / And I, I couldn't love another girl / Cause you, you make me feel like / I'm intoxicated"**_ _**\- Intoxicated,**_ **_The Cab_**

* * *

Her plans aren't until tomorrow so she tries to ignore her father's absence at the breakfast table ( _even when he isn't here he is affecting you- weak)_ and the nonsensical chattering of her aunt.

"And I have tickets to a helicopter tour but I know I get so _terribly_ airsick..." The immaculately dressed -including coiffed hair, no less- Aphrodite exclaims, self-aggrandizing as per usual.

The word helicopter sparks something in her other than fear ( _ridiculous you are to be scared of heights it's not like you're more likely to die in a plane than you are on a mission by gunfire_ )- a memory.

 _"I've always wanted to be up in a plane and never co_ _me down. Stay up there for hours and never let my problems catch up," Nico tells her, the night before they went their separate ways._

 _"I don't think I have ever had that feeling." Her resolve is no longer adamantine; now it is steel, and soon, if she stays here, keeps doing (all these things bad for you and not at all related to your mission) this relationship, it will become porcelain._

 _"Why not?" He is nothing but open curiosity, his honesty not just contagious but maybe he uses it as a battering ram, breaking her down._

 _"I guess it's too open. I must be agoraphobic or something." she tries to laugh it off._ _"Too much to hide?" He asks, knowingly (break it off he knows too much)._

 _"Haven't we all."_

 _And that much was true; she just didn't know his skeletons yet, despite her having plenty of her own, all of them pretty pretty secrets, threaded ribbons through the bones._

"Aunt Aphrodite, could I have your tickets?"

 **{~xXx~}**

She used to shoplift, Thalia recalls, the thought accompanied by a guilt-inducing rush of fondness as she walks around the store. Aimlessly, she rummages through a rack of dresses, thinking back to the days when she would have actually cared about them, which tag would be easiest to take off with the innocent-looking (almost like her) nail scissors in her bag.

Now, she picks out a red, lacy dress studded with sequins, burgundy skinnies with patches on the knees, and a silk champagne dress with sequined patterns and a mid-thigh hem. Trying them all on, she discovers the miracle of miracles: they all fit perfectly. As she watches the flounce of the red dress and the way it swirls around her hips, an arbitrary thought runs through her head: _would Nico think she looks good in this?_ Longing, unfamiliar and forbidden, fills her, and suddenly she wants him there like she needs to breathe. Wants to see if his eyes skim over her body and darken, if his hands follow his pupils over her frame, over her skin, and then Thalia can almost feel his fingers, the heat of them seeping into her veins and turning her blood into electricity, as fizzy as champagne-

"Thalia _?_ Are you in there _?_ " Waiting has made her aunt experience a sharp vicissitude in mood; impatience runs in the family.

"Yep, I'm coming out. Don't worry, I just have to change out and then I'll buy these."

"Okay." As she is ringing up the clothes and placing them into a paper bag, the cashier pauses to tell her the total. Thalia is startled for a moment before she hands the woman her black AMEX credit card, all the while conflicted. She is excited to see Nico, and all the while cursing herself for ever even speaking to anyone that she could possibly _fall in love with / be distracted by / start a relationship with / all of the above (are the same)._

 **{~xXx~}**

Thalia has lunch before the trip, hopes she doesn't vomit it back up, kills time ( _the least illegal thing you've killed_ ).

Nerves are a common problem in her line of work, and she wonders if it's easier for people with congenital analgesia - those born with the inability to feel pain- or just harder, if they throw themselves into emotionally destructing situations to compensate for the fact that can't get hurt.

 _Get hurt_. It really means to be injured, but if you don't feel pain, can it still be hurt?

Thalia is still contemplating this when he shows up.

"Can you fly this thing?" Nico asks, and Thalia swallows, trying to ignore the dread forming in her stomach at the word _fly_.

"No. It's got a pilot. " _What are you doing?_ Shut up, fear.

"Tell me again- is it billions or millions you make?"

"I'd tell you but then I'd have to kill you. " And that is truer than the bantering tone is, should be a warning to her and it is- one that she won't listen to.

"I believe you could," he tells her, but flirtation isn't the only thing in his eyes: there's a jitteriness there, a hyperactive look that she remembers but can't quite place.

"Well, just don't forget it," Thalia smirks at him, swings herself into the helicopter and pretends the nerves are adrenaline, wonders why the heck she's here, why she didn't suggest _let's go out for dinner_ or _why don't we see a show?_

No what she really doesn't understand is why the heck she keeps starting things that have to end.

And that is even more true when she recognizes the look in his eyes as drug withdrawal.


	6. VI

**Warning: Mature Language. Viewer Discretion is advised.**

 **(Lol, I love when they say that, don't you?)**

* * *

 ** _"Funny you're the broken one / When I'm the only one who needed, saving / 'Cause when you never see the light / It's hard to tell which one of us is, caving" - Stay, Rihanna ft. Mikky Ekko_**

* * *

Nico orders for them in rapid Spanish, a fact her inner feminist is too tired to protest but does anyways ( _stop fighting when nothing will change doesn't just apply to this_ ). "You do know I am perfectly capable of ordering for myself, do you not?"

He arches a brow, says, "Do you trust me?"

It is a perfectly simple question, no real expectation of an honest answer behind it- from anyone else, that is. The last person she trusted was Luke. And he left or died or disappeared, betrayed her without trying to. So what does she know of virtue, of loyalty? "I... We'll see. So, you're tri-lingual, then? Spanish, Italian, English..."

"I moved to the States when I was ten. I learned Spanish in high school, and I already knew Italian."

"Where in the U.S.?" ( _small talk to grasp for more time- why are you treating this like a mission, Thalia?_ )

"Vegas."

Thalia takes a sip of the wine; it's a Pinot Grigois, sweet, like most whites are. Sweet, unlike the words she wishes she could swallow, _(but you'll never get anything you wish for so why bother?)_ and wants to wash down with the liquor, but instead she asks him, "Smoke anything lately?"

His countenance is impassive- no spluttering, choking, or going red in the face. When silence stretches between them, a sea of murky emotions and unfilled blanks, she continues. "No? Maybe I'm wrong, maybe it's not pot. Maybe it's crystal meth, or coke, or ecstasy or Valium-"

"What's with the fucking third degree, Thalia?" He slams his wine glass down, so hard she's surprised nothing breaks ( _except for her heart- oh, wait, you never had one_ ). "You're not my mother, not my sister- oh wait, they're both fucking dead and they died on this exact same day, and all you care about is what I would be doing if I wasn't fucking sober?"

"How the fuck was I supposed to know?" ( _anger is her shield- better than pain, better than tears)_ Thalia snaps. "Okay, how in hell was I supposed to know? How in hell did you expect me to know what you are running away from?"

"I"m not effing running, okay? I'm sober now, aren't I?"

"Not for long. I recognize withdrawal when I see it."

"And what are _you_ running from, then? What were _your_ vices, huh?"

They are throwing everything down on the table, anger and raw honesty, so raw it hurts, like tearing out her heart and soul ( _does she still have either of those?_ ).

"I don't _have_ any anymore."

"I said _were_." His words are aimed to hurt but his expression is unreadable and she can't tell if the way he speaks like he's shooting at her is intentional.

"Driving. Drinking. Not always both at the same time. Now answer my fucking question." She swallows (too late) her wine like she should have _her_ words.

"All right. Just make sure you don't regret caring." His words are cryptic, but she can read his face now- vulnerability, carefully guarded.

Like he can only hide one thing at once- ( _you`re much better at this, at this game of hide-and-seek with your emotions_ )

 **{~xXx~}**

This is their modern fairytale, their story where people die and get drunk and die all over again. ( _you would know, you would know a lot about dying_ )

Once upon a time, there was a boy. He lived in the Italian countryside with his parents and his sister. His father was hardly ever home, but that was okay because his sister always played lots of games with him and his mother laughed a lot. Always happy.

And until he was maybe six or seven, the little boy lived like this. But then, one day, his father stopped coming home and the bills stopped getting paid and they had to move into the city with their relatives that hated children. And that was still fine, because he still had his mother and his sister, Bianca.

Until disaster struck once again and his mother got ill and she _died_ and their relatives kicked them out and they were all alone on the streets and at least he still had Bianca- not.

She was hit by a car and fate was cruel and kind all at once, because Nico was taken in by a family that moved to America where he ended up in Vegas with a life full of temper tantrums and _you aren't my mother_ and failing report cards and crying himself to sleep and _may i suggest you see a therapist_ and he did and that therapist was called _marijuana_ and _cocaine_ and _vodka_.

Then, he got clean after someone found him passed out in an alley and called the police and got his crap together and moved back to Italy, far away from his original home: Venice.

 **{~xXx~}**

Her phone rings, and Thalia goes inside, to the bathroom, to answer it. It's her father. "I need you to come back to New York. _Now_."

"Don`t we have a branch in Barcelona, dearest Father? Can't I meet you there?"

A resigned sigh, engineered to ensure she feels the silent _look how much trouble you're causing me_ through the phone. "All right. Be there by eleven tomorrow. On the dot." And then, it's dial tone.

( _The empty, lonely **beep** is her constant companion after **his** calls, that and a stiff drink._)

But this is _now_ and not her lonely New York apartment, drinking with Luke, or some seedy bar in the Bronx, griping to her partner- this is _Barcelona_ and a seaside restaurant, and Nico. Nico, Nico, Nico. If she says his name enough times, it'll stay there, and she'll be able to pretend that _forever_ is a viable concept for the,. But dammit, she wants to have him, to keep him.

Even if they were two screw ups, two drug-addicted nobodies like they could so easily have been- in a thousand different worlds- she'd pick him, she'd want him.

And that's what scares her the most: that this is more than lust, and far less replaceable.

What kind of messed-up lottery did she end up in before birth, that she has all these creature-comforts, all these high end designer stilettos and fancy food and penthouse apartments and a father that uses her as an assassin? What kind of lottery is it, that Nico's sister and mother and father disappeared and made him turn to substance abuse?

Thalia breaks down, incredibly tired of wanting to change things she can't change, of wanting things she can't have.


	7. VII

_**"I can't keep waking up to these reminders of who I am / A failure at everything / Eighteen going on extinct / I know my place / It's nowhere you should roam" -Reinventing the Wheel to Run Myself Over, Fall Out Boy**_

 _ **~xXx~**_

"We need to stop meeting like this," Nico says, when he finds her a sobbing, messy wreck.

"Last time you did not meet me, you _called_ and I was _crying,_ " Thalia snaps, anger all she has left, the leaking, hissing life raft she is stubbornly clinging to amidst an ocean of tears. She spits the word _crying_ like it is a swear, a foul word, and it is; weakness is forbidden in her line of work.

And then they have said enough words, filled enough silences, made enough conversation, pulled enough skeletons out of closets, because he is holding her, hanging onto her like if he doesn't he'll fall apart, instead of the other way around ( _instead of what shouldn't be, because she ought to be self-sufficient_ ) ( _ought to be a thousand things she isn't_ )

They fill all the cracks in their souls with touches instead of mortar, and she kisses him, savours the pleased look on his face because rarely, so rarely is she making anyone happy, and she lets the feeling linger, lets it hold her together, chase away her demons long enough to ask him, "Do you want to come to my place?"

 **{~xXx~}**

The lift doors open, and they tumble out, a tangle of limbs into an empty hallway.

"I want you," she breathes against his neck, looking up at him to remind herself who she is with. She doesn't need to, really, not with his scent clouding her senses, blooming in her mind. Without high heels on, her forehead tucks under his chin in a romance novel worthy moment where someone ought to think, _like they were made for each other_ but she won't kid herself.

"All the way?" he whispers back, his breath a wisp like dandelion seeds against the shell of her ear before he scrapes his teeth against the lobe in contrast, making her shudder. He is measured, deliberate, careful, like he is scared of her leaving, like she might leave a gap that he can't fill. ( _too far too far shut up_ )

"Not yet," Thalia murmurs, fishing her key card out of her bag, opening the hotel door for them to stumble into but not onto the bed. "Other things, though...?"

"Sounds good," Nico tells her, breaking away.

They spend the afternoon- or what is left of it- watching old black and white movies, and an action one thrown in there, _Captain America: The Winter Soldier,_ Thalia's pick, to remind her of who she is, what she does- and what she can't.

They spend half of the movies making out on the couch of her penthouse suite.

Her shirt comes off, and so does his.

Her phone rings.

It is her dad's assistant, reminding her _you have an appointment tomorrow with your father at eleven._ Like he is a dentist. ( _root canals might hurt less_ )

Nico says that he should go. She ushers him out, pulls a shirt on, stealing his. He laughs at this, zips up his jacket with nothing on under.

She wonders what she's gotten herself into.

* * *

As she rides the elevator up, up,up, Thalia reflects on her life. She's been a rich girl, a party girl, a spy. A liar, an assassin, a traitor. Loyalties always in question; lonely, lonely, lonely.

Being a spy isn't all leather catsuits and glamour and secret trapdoors. It isn't oodles of money and top-secret gadgets and grenades disguised as lipstick, or whatever the James Bond movies say. It's _not._

Here's what it is, in three simple words: pain, guilt, and fear.

The first one was the simplest: the physical, from an injury, a bullet, a laser, a broken leg from leaping out a window. The emotional: grief -despite what you'd been taught- when someone died, when _life_ happened _,_ at the general implications of what you were doing caught up with you.

Then came guilt, trickier, craftier. Guilt snuck up on you; you couldn't use it the way you could pain -as a distraction- and it refused to be ignored, refused to get easier to deal with. The first stab of guilt ( _an ache, really, but she prefers sharp pain to long dull pain, prefers things that hurt like heck and end really fast_ ) was just as painful as the last.

And finally, fear. Fear kept you alive on a mission, spared you so it could play with you some more. Fear made you cautious, paranoid, a survivor. It helped you get the job done. But fear _after_ the mission met up with guilt and threw a party in your head, asked you _what have you become_? while the guilt whispered _you liked it, they screamed/cried/bled_ _and you **liked it**._

 _That_ , Thalia thought, as the richly lacquered elevator doors opened, _was the worst of them all._

Fear.

 **{~xXx~}**

She needs to leave.

The luxurious, old fashioned top floor office that Zeus Grace occupies is sprawling and manages to -despite the dark mahogany wainscotting and eighties light fixture- feel spacious. But right now all Thalia feels is claustrophobia, like the walls are caving in and this lifestyle, this line of work, is a corset, with stays yanked to bone-crushing tightness.

"Your behaviour has been unacceptable. Jason never would have done something like this," her father continues, ignoring the fact that Jason has forsaken his family to go to Princeton and become a lawyer instead of being the heir to Grace Enterprises, Inc. Leaving them, leaving her, to her father's mercy- and he only has mercy for strangers.

"Jason isn't even _here,_ " She pointed out. "Surely you didn't keep me here to do what you always do, which is scold me. "

"I _do_ have a motive for your presence here. We discovered some startling footage back in New York, which I want you to look at."

Shifting forwards in her seat, Thalia drops her bag onto the floor and peers at the monitor that her father turns to face her. A fair-haired man wearing a black ski mask, black _everything_ , really, punches in the override access code, and then enters the high-security vault. The screen shows him speaking to someone on an earpiece, and Thalia jabs pause.

"Wait! The only possible place you could be speaking to someone with an earpiece in the high-security areas is in the control room! Where's the control room footage for..." She squints at the date- "August fifteenth, five-fifty-five pm?"

Her father turns the monitor back towards himself, types in a few things, and then swivels it back to her. "There."

The man in the control room is not masked, but she doesn't recognize him, even though something niggles at the back of her mind, insistent. Around him, the normal control-room operators are tied up and unconscious in their seats; he is standing up. "Do you recognize this man?" She demands.

Zeus Grace frowns, stroking his jaw in thought, then looks pained... betrayed? "That's Winston. He tutored your brother when you were young... and Luke."


	8. VIII

_**"She said, she said, she said / Why don't you just drop dead?" -A Little Less Sixteen Candles, A Little More Touch Me ~Fall Out Boy**_

* * *

"What do you mean, you can't find him?" booms Zeus Grace over the phone to some poor, unsuspecting temp who will likely lose their job within the hour. "I told you- no, I didn't make a mistake! The only mistakes here are yours."

Thalia has ensconced herself in a cream coloured wingback chair, all studs and linen and brass-capped legs. The seat's back wraps around her, blocking her vision- but no amount of Fall Out Boy will drown out her father. No, nothing stops Zeus Grace from doing things he wants to- she wishes she had the same skill, the same sheer will that forces things into being. The phone lands on the desk with a thud, and Thalia winces at what she knows will come.

"Honestly, the nerve of him! Waltzing into my territory like he still works here and then just disappearing." Her father fumes. If this were a cartoon, steam would pour out of his ears, but the only thing steaming is the coffee pot. Thalia pours herself a cup, no cream, no sugar, and pours one for her father, made the same way. Bitter, like life.

"Thank you, " he says distractedly, and she fights back the glow of praise, of being praised instead of scolded, wonders if she should see a therapist, decides that would mean confessions, and killers get jail time.

"You're welcome." Thalia makes her words crisp, nothing extra, nothing more than he deserves."Did you find him?"

"No," Zeus Grace sighs, the word followed by a sigh that is more sound than air, more facade than feelings (so that's where you get it from). "He's vanished."

She runs her hands over her floral leggings, crimson flowers blooming on black, tucked into combat boots, worn with a black cropped sweater over a lace-collared, sheer white blouse. The room has floor to ceiling windows facing the east, with steel grey curtains that are controlled by the touch of a remote button. Beneath her feet, the carpet is hunter green in charcoal and black tartan, and her chair is next to a table with a scalloped rim and ornate carvings of, oddly enough, cherubim. She mentally catalogs these things because if she doesn't, she'll think about things she wants to be wrong. Because in the darkest parts of her, she wonders if it was Jason.

Not Luke.

Jason.

 **{~xXx~}**

"Nico," Thalia says over the phone, his name fitting perfectly in her mouth, the weight of it enough on her tongue. ( _Not like Luke, who you should not think of. Not like Luke, his name light as air, who drifted away just as easily._ )

"Where are you?" He says, voice half laugh, like just talking to her is enough to make him smile. The thought is bittersweet. She brushes it off.

"Why, do you want to see me?" She teases, keeping this light, keeping them unattached.

"Yes. So humour me, won't you?"

"I'm back. "

"In Venice?" "Where else?" she is tempted to say _back home_ but that would be the opposite of her mission ( _she has to treat this like a mission, shove her fears into a box and compartmentalize her all her feelings_ ).

"Can I see you?"

"Tomorrow." (Is too far away.)

She has to find a bar, first, and complete her _real_ mission.

 **{~xXx~}**

The flight wasn't long, but time limps by like a turtle on crutches when you're not having fun. Since she's anti-drug/cigarette/escape now, Thalia finds the hotel bar.

It is a modern, classy affair: black lacquered tables, the bar as slick as its bartender: all glossy black granite, stools a leather seat atop a steel bar. The walls have velvet wallpaper, pale blue-grey above a grey wainscotting. People in sophisticated clothing talk quietly in Belgian wingback tears, their martinis, Bellinis, or gin and tonics balanced upon sleek glass topped consoles. Thalia orders a Dom Perignon, even though there is nothing to celebrate, because it will get her buzzed but not overly drunk too fast, and swirls the liquid around in her glass, contemplative. Not wanting to get too drunk because she hasn't eaten since breakfast and by now it is five, she fishes a bag of crappy airplane pretzels from her camel-coloured leather cross body bag. As she sips the liquor, she (hopefully) indiscreetly removes her shoes, high-heeled, lace up ankle boots the same shade as her bag. Since, frankly, they hurt like hell.

"A whiskey, please," says a person next to her as they slide into a seat. They are blonde, with green eyes -wrong, wrong, wrong, not Luke, calm down- and a bland sense of style: navy suit, brown shoes, navy and brown tie. He turns to her. "What are we celebrating?"

His grin has made enough girls swoon that there is a touch of arrogance to it, but not as many as his British accent, probably. She rolls her eyes; he's as expected as his outfit. "You leaving?"

"But you're here, so why would I go?" He flirts easily, carelessly, recklessly; she wonders where Luke is, where he hid after he disappeared that night when she found out his _true_ affiliations- he'd been working undercover for an agency, but they'd discovered his double life and were after him. Thalia had helped him hide. She regretted it ever since.

"Because I don't want to see you?" She suggests, banter her autopilot. Fake-Luke is overly persistent, if he is really Luke in disguise. Luke had hated contacts, sucked at accents.

"Or because you might leave with me." He smiles at her again, and a voice in her head pipes up _you need the practice and what if he **is** Luke?_

"Yep. That's it. You caught me. I have just been waiting at this bar all night for somebody to take me to their place. I'm Thalia." She sighs, puts her empty glass down. The bartender pours her another drink.

"Good to know. I'm Luke. So, what do you do for a living?" The abruptness is surprising; like an essay written with no transitions.

The rest of the conversation is a set of lies on a stage propped up by truths; a brother -Jay- studying at Yale, who's the golden child and wants to be a doctor; a rarely around father with a lot of money that's always around; a mother dead in a car crash- oh, and what does she do for a living? She's an architect; she wants to build things that last forever; she wants this life to be forever; she wants to stop stealing her best friend's words; she wants to want something she can have.

Finally, the conversation ends, and he tells her he has a package to deliver to someone and that's why he came here, and he beams at her while he says it.

His smile cuts like a knife.

So did Luke's.

She puts a tracker on him, a barely-detectable thing clipped to the inside of his pocket when she drops her purse, scattering lipstick tubes and receipts everywhere and he oh-so chivalrously helps her picks it up.

( _and then what happened what was your fairy-tale ending?_ )

Thalia runs up the hotel stairs over and over, up and down and up again, falls asleep too tired to cry.

* * *

 **Please review! Reviews are love!**


	9. IX

**This chapter is dedicated to** BooksandSunsets **, who said she wanted more Thalia / Nico scenes. However, she didn't specify what sort, so... Don't say I didn't warn you!**

 **wink wink, nudge nudge.**

 **And to** sinner or saint **: This story isn't Thaluke. So no, there won't be anything like that. It's Thalico. Go read something Thaluke if you want a hot Thalia/Luke scene. Sorry for wasting your time.**

guest: **Thank you so much for all your kind reviews! :)**

* * *

 _ **"Please take my hand / And please take me dancing / And please leave me stranded / It's so romantic / 'Cause baby I could build a castle / Out of all the bricks they threw at me" - New Romantics, Taylor Swift**_

 **{~xXx~}**

Eight hours and thirty seven minutes after she's rediscovered Luke and collapsed into bed, her phone chimes.

Thalia is in the shower when it happens; a Linkin Park tee and ripped skinny jeans, complete with ear spike and combat boots, are laid out on the ottoman in the cavernous bathroom. She sees the screen light up through the slightly-foggy glass shower door, but deigns it of little importance. It's only with her hair in a towel, a bottle of Bath and Body Works lotion (Endless Weekend, bought on impulse before leaving New York) in hand, that she checks it. The text is from Nico.

 ** _We need to talk. The canal._**

After that, she dresses in a rush, finger-combs her hair, draws on eyeliner crookedly, and almost forgets mascara. By the time she gets there, Nico is waiting, hands shoved into his pockets, expression not quite blank -but hard, set, an edge to his jaw, which is dark with unshaven stubble. She wants to know why he hasn't shaved; what has gotten him so worked up; how his jawline would feel against her skin. Thalia pushes all three thoughts out of her mind, worries about her choice of clothing - not in a teenage girl way, mind you, but because it's a throwback to _her_ teenage years, and seeing Luke brought up old memories of the time when she was foolish enough to believe that she could escape her feelings, escape her _life_.

"You wanted to talk to me?" She is cognizant, suddenly, of her words, of the effect they might have, and she is used to only two: damage or nothing. But here is a whole new one, and she doesn't know what it is.

"I did. I _do_." He is coming apart at the seams now, crumbling a little, and she recognizes this emotion: barely suppressed rage.

"Why?" Thalia keeps her voice neutral, picks her poison at a pH level of seven.

"Because of _this_ ," and Nico is shaking now, anger coming out at full force to show something else beneath it. He pulls out a magazine from a bag that went previously unnoticed. It's _People_ magazine, the cover clearly showing a slow day for gossip and scandal, because that's _her_ on it, talking to _him_ , her face splotchy with tears, at the restaurant in Barcelona. The caption reads _Grace heiress spotted with mysterious stranger in Europe!_

 _Shit_. Her father will never stop berating her for this; Thalia can hear the lecture already. "So what? You know I'm rich."

"And you know I'm _not_. The point is, Thalia, _you didn't tell me_. This is a whole other level-" Nico goes on, but the anger goes transparent and beneath it is an emotion she knows all too well: fear.

"Shut up," She interrupts. "Are you being serious right now? _You honestly think it's a big deal that I didn't tell you I'm a Grace?_ What I- What my father makes isn't the best part of me. It isn't the _only_ part of me either. Why can't you see past that and figure out your _real_ issues and stop trying to pin them all on me, huh?"

"This isn't _about_ me and my damn demons. It's about you not telling me who you are." He is hiding, shying away from her bullet-wound-words, and doing a damned terrible job of it.

"Stop trying to _run away_. It doesn't even matter to you, what kind of family I come from, what kind of _money_ I come from, does it? The reality is, you're scared. You're effing _terrified_ of getting close to anyone ever since everyone you loved got killed off. You regret telling me anything, ever, because now that I know, now that I've seen your dark side, I might back off-" She stops when he looks upset; not as though he might hit her, but like he might fall to pieces, this much truth a weight like the sky, with him nowhere near Atlas.

"Get out."

She was right. Thalia was right in the way that she hated - about things she didn't want to be - and this was her fact, her truth pulled out like drawing water from a well, drawing blood from flesh: That her words are all or nothing, destruction or meaningless.

 **{~xXx~}**

It's the day for cryptic, unpleasant could-go-either-way texts, because at lunch - a rather good gnocchi- the words _come and get me. 402 3rd st. 2:34 pm. Alone._

Bored and nearly finished her pasta, she grits her teeth, packs two guns, and wonders _Luke_ or _Jason_?

Thalia places a hand on her gun, hidden beneath her loose leather jacket, leans back against the wall. A short Latino guy, in his late teens or early twenties, dressed in grease-spattered jeans and a trench coat is walking towards her, and he says, "Thalia Grace?" He leans towards her while he says it, winking.

The move is so ridiculously flirtatious that she laughs despite her terrible morning. "Yes?"

"I was told to ask you a question as proof of your authenticity: Where," he asks, so already out-of -character when he's serious and she has no idea why she thinks that, but this seems like the kind of guy who's going to annoy her to death. "Did your brother get the scar on his upper lip from?"

"From trying to eat a stapler," Thalia replies automatically.

"Open sesame!" He leads her to a door almost invisibly set into the wall, barely noticeable were it not for her years of training.

"Welcome, " says a voice as the door swings open with a click and a burst of fog-machine steam. (well, no, but for such drama, there should be)

Jason.

 **{~xXx~}**

"Why did you do it?"

Thalia is seriously considering using one of the two firearms she brought if Jason doesn't tell her why he decided it was a good idea to delete all the data ever recorded at Grace enterprises and essentially give their father a coronary.

Her little brother doesn't say anything.

"Answer me Jason! Our father is already going to be pissed off enough about my-" she breaks off- if he won't tell her anything, she'll be the same way.

"Your what?" Just like Nico this morning, he pulls out the magazine proclaiming her love life to the world. "Your secret Italian boyfriend?"

She rolls her eyes. "When did you get so dramatic? I swear, has Leo been rubbing off on you?" Leo is the trench coat wearing guy, who has made three toy cars out of paper clips while they've been here. And the cars actually run.

"Yes! I knew you would eventually see the wisdom of the brilliant Repair Boy!" Leo crows. Then again, he has also demanded of Jason that he should've told him his sister was so hot.

"Oh, shut up, Leo. Go back to your toy cars," counters a girl with braided hair wearing a Hello Kitty shirt and ripped leggings. She has just walked into the room. "Hey, Sparky. "

Jason looks... sheepish? It's an odd expression whatever it is as he looks up at the girl from his seat on the concrete floor of the barely-furnished apartment. "Hey, Piper. "

"Who's this?" Piper nods at Thalia, seating herself beside Jason.

Her brother opens his mouth to reply, but Thalia beats him to it. "I'm Thalia, Jason's sister. "

She thinks she detects relief in the girl's face. "I'm Piper... Jason's girlfriend. "

"You didn't tell me you had a girlfriend, Jase!" Thalia ribs at Jason, trying to draw him away from any topics involving her. Or their dad. Or anything unpleasant.

"We were talking about your boyfriend. " Jason is terrible at deflection, probably because he always hated learning to work for their father.

"Are you so ashamed of me that your sister doesn't know I exist?" Piper jokes, elbowing the blonde in the side.

"Pipes, I think you should go. " Jason says this reluctantly. But he says it all the same. Her brother is honourable if nothing else.

"You're kicking me out. What kind of family drama do you have that could possibly top my family drama?"

"I just can't talk about it in front of you, okay?"

Piper raises an eyebrow, then leans over to kiss Jason on the cheek. "Okay."

"You too, Leo."

He sighs melodramatically. "At least I'm not being the third wheel. As always. "

Once they leave, Jason turns to her. "I swear, I did this for the best, Thalia. I just wanted you to get out of there. Away from our father. Don't you see? If all the data is gone, how could he make you go on another mission? "

"But what difference does it make when I still have another person to kill? When I will still have to live with every single ghost I've ever killed? What about that?" Thalia is furious and sad and reckless because she is furious and sad.

"Thalia-I'm sorry- I wasn't thinking-" Jason starts.

"You're never thinking. Why aren't you at Princeton, Jason?"

"I got expelled. My roommate framed me when he hid crack in my bag. "

"Leo?" She never knows, even though he seems more like the type to overdose on caffeine rather than drugs.

He shakes his head adamantly. "Never. Some other guy. Octavian. Scrawny little shit. "

Thalia frowns. Her brother is the golden boy, class president, All-American football quarterback. He doesn't swear. "That sucks."

"Yeah. Look, I'm sorry about what I said to you before Thanksgiving. I was just having a bad day and I know that's no excuse but-" her brother is rambling, expelling words in the hope of forgiveness.

Enough words for enough forgiveness. Life doesn't work that way. But Thalia is done with caring about how things are supposed to work, so she leans over and wraps her arms around her brother. It's familiar, even if he's taller than she is now ( _and a better person_ ), and she breathes in the scent of him, like she did when they were young, tells herself she'd become superman to protect him- only he's superman, and she's the villain.


	10. X

" _ **And if it gets harder / Then I don't wanna break all alone / I wanna break in your arms / Sometimes, when I'm sleeping / I still, feel you breathing / You stole, all my good dreams / I don't care, I'd let you take it" -I Don't Wanna Break, Christina Perri**_

 **{~xXx~}**

"So what are you going to do about it?" Annabeth phrases the question like she thinks Thalia will actually do something, will actually throw away this opportunity to do what she has to- because Annabeth knows her so well, she knows she will.

"What's there to do?" A sigh, from the phone, because her best friend also knows that she will stall and be in denial.

"There is _everything_ to do." And then the blonde sounds like Silena, or maybe even Aunt Aphrodite on a good day. "Stop being in denial- " _see?_ "and figure something out."

"Fine. What would you do if it was Percy?" Thalia asks this answerless question precisely because it's an answerless question. ( _because your best friend is a thousand times luckier than you, even though she was in the same business before you now she's all better_ )

Sigh number two. "I don't know. Ignore him till he makes the first move for being such an idiot- Wait! That doesn't apply to your situation so don't go taking that advice."

"You told me to take it. Too late. See you next time I'm in the States, Annie. Bye!" She hangs up before her friend can murder her for calling her Annie. ( _and other things but really the world would just be a better place without you_ )

 **~xXx~**

In the two weeks that she doesn't speak with Nico, a lot of things happen/are discovered.

The tracker is either malfunctioning or Fake(Possible?)Luke hasn't moved the package yet. He stays in his hotel room -this she knows due to the handy-dandy GPS app on her phone- and occasionally goes out to eat. She gets pictures, but the camera is crappy and very low to the ground. He meets people she doesn't know but finds suspicious- all their tattoos say THE TITANS.

She Googles her name and discovers no articles other than the scandalous People magazine one, and vague mentions of her in the society pages. This is good. Nothing else will inflame her father.

She studiously ignores the fact that Nico's contact information is still programmed onto her phone, and considers blocking him. Avoiding him is surprisingly easy- he is away all week. She (tries not to) look for him, and fails. (At both.)

She texts _him_ a lot.

Percy and Annabeth come for a visit.

She invites Percy out for drinks one night, says they'll meet at eight in the lobby.

 **{~xXx~}**

When she arrives at the bar, a strong, peculiar feeling hits her.

It's familiar, that much is clear, but it's been a while, so she can't quite place it. Then she spots the halogen pinspots glinting off a head of blonde hair- _danger_. ( _is it Luke- why do you care- is that feeling fear or adrenaline_ ) Thalia may never know, because just then, Percy taps her on the shoulder, and she turns around to face her cousin's crooked grin. He and Annabeth are a few years younger than her (and Luke), twenty-four to her twenty-seven, but she and the blonde have the same drive to get out of the suffocating clutches of their parents' plans and make it big. (The difference is, textile industries are a helluva lot less psychiatrist-funding than assassinating people.)

"Hey, Kelp Head," Thalia greets him, all thoughts of Luke shoved away ( _just not forgotten impossible to_ ).

"I get seaweed stuck in my hair _one time_ -" here he grins ( _like the world might not end- she misses what she never had_ ) "-and both you and Annabeth can't let it go?"

"But, Percy, you know your fiance only calls you Seaweed Brain because you've got seaweed for brains, don't you?" She teases, grabbing a seat at the bar and gesturing for him to do the same. "What are you having? It's on me."

"No, I can't let you do that," Percy is chivalrous to a fault, since his mother -then later his few girlfriends- hammered it into him from an early age.

"You have to. Next night, it's me _and_ Annabeth, and you have to pay. Congrats, by the way, on your impending doom- I mean wedding," she jokes off half the tension; she'll drink off the rest. "Vodka tonic ,please, and onion rings."

"That sounds disgusting," Percy crinkles his nose in revulsion as he orders," Coke with a cheeseburger please."

"It's better than it sounds, I swear. How's engaged life working out for you?" (Because she's happy for them, her best friend and her cousin. Not at all wistful, remorseful, longing for a nonexistent future that exists in wisps of dreams and forbidden wishes, someone to wait for her at the altar.)

Percy launches into a story about apartment hunting ("We're staying in New York.") and how their current living conditions are ("Spiders? Really?") and a thousand other trivial, easily taken for granted moments. They don't mention the way her onion rings are only half-finished, or her drink always empties too fast, or the rings beneath her eyes- nothing about her (nothing not polite dinnertime conversation) really. They talk about Jason, and how he dropped out of Princeton ("Are you kidding me?" "I know, right?" "Who would do that?") and that he's got a girlfriend ("What's she like?" "I don't know. No bad vibes, though, so we'll see how it goes.")

By the end of the night, they are all talked out, and she is more than a little unsteady on her feet. Percy walks her back to her room. She almost forgets about Luke. (And her missed call from him.)

 **{~xXx~}**

Later, she goes out for drinks with Annabeth.

(She's taking them out separately to avoid third-wheeling. Loneliness from lack of love is only intensified by sitting next to two people clearly made for each other.)

French Blondes, in fact. The light, citrusy taste combined with the midday buzz makes her feel much better- that and a fresh application of mascara in the restaurant bathroom. "This hurts a lot. " Thalia admits when the liqueur has loosen her tongue. "Love, or whatever this is. "

"It's supposed to. Especially if you love a really stupid guy." Annabeth agrees, nodding. The drinks have made her a little tipsy too (the drunk leading the drunk.)

"I bet you have a lot of experience with that," Thalia laughs, and tilts back her head to finish her drink.

"I do. This guy you're in love with- what's he like?" Asks Annabeth. She copies her, emptying the crystal glass. A bartender tops their drinks off.

"He's really really hot." Thalia tells her, nodding solemnly . "And I like his laugh. God, I sound like a teenage girl, don't I?"

"Yes. That's how you usually get when you're drunk, though. Do you like him more than Luke?" This is the standard standard that Annabeth measures Thalia's few boyfriends against, but she doesn't really want to talk about him.

"Luke is back. He's a jerk. He's a creepy jerk. Even worse." She shudders at the words. "I like him more than Luke."

"He's back? Wait, what?"Annabeth leans close and lowers her voice. "Thalia, promise you'll stay away from him."

"Too late." Thalia studies her nails. "He sent me a message. He's watching me. Also, it's creepy. I wish I knew what he was going to do."

"Yeah, well that's life, I guess. Back to this guy… All you told me is that he is really hot with a nice laugh."

"Really _really_ hot. Quiet, observant. He used to do drugs. I think he still does. That's how I met him, actually. He offered me a smoke." Thalia treats this like a fairy tale, because things like this don't _happen_ to people like her.

( _They don't, and you better remember it_.)

"I would say that's not good, but I distinctly remember Luke offering me coke. Or crystal meth. Your glass is empty." Annabeth jerks her chin at the bartender, who refills both their drinks.

"He really is a creepy jerk. Do you remember those days, though, when we were little, and Percy was still living with his dad in Cali, and it was just the three of us? We had the craziest games. We always made him be the princess and he always let us rescue him. I always got to be the dragon," Thalia reminisces sadly, and Annabeth, even drunk, can sense that this is dangerous territory.

"It spoiled him. He thought we'd always be there to clean up his messes. You were, in the end."

"I was, and it sucked." Now, everything with Luke is tainted, tinged with the shadow of him leaving. of him offering _her_ crystal meth, coke, and her taking it.

( _it takes two to tango_ )


	11. XI

_**"You're in my veins / And I cannot get you out / Oh you're all I taste / At night inside of my mouth / Oh you run away / Because I am not what you found" -In My Veins, Andrew Belle**_

:::

 **Nico's Voicemail:**

DECEMBER 20, 2016 ~ 11:00 PM

 _"That was a dick move of you, and I didn't do anything wrong. So you apologize. There."_

DECEMBER 21, 2016 - 9:34 PM

 _"I love you. Or I could have loved you. But I think about you a lot. And I like thinking about you. It makes me happy. But you haven't apologized yet- and that makes me sad- I need to go throw up now._ _"_

DECEMBER 22, 2015 ~ 10:37 AM

 _"I'm still not sorry. And you're still not apologizing. One of these things has to go, Nico. And I'm always right."_

DECEMBER 24, 2016 ~ 7:10 PM

 _"I miss your laugh. You have a really nice laugh, you know that? I could listen to it all day, get drunk on it. It's like- it's like a really nice red wine. Chardonnay, or something. Your laugh, I mean. But this isn't an apology. So delete this message unless_ you're _apologizing."_

DECEMBER 24, 2016 ~ 8:34 PM

 _"It's... hey, Annie, what time is it? What? Oh, never mind. I was going to recreate a Taylor Swift song, but you can pretend like I didn't. Call, because I_ didn't _. Because, I have a resolve of steel, so_ you _should apologize."_

DECEMBER 24, 2016 ~ 9:52 PM

 _"Apologize. Or the force will be with you._

DECEMBER 25, 2016 ~ 11:30 AM

 _"Oops, wrong Star Wars reference. Sorry-_ not sorry _._ APOLOGIZE."

* * *

:::

It starts with him calling her back.

Her voicemail is nowhere near as full as his probably is, but there are a few messages.

The first is from Nico. "Hey, _I got your messages."_ A pause, then his next words sound like he's grinning, or suppressing a laugh. _"I, uh, don't know how much you had to drink when you left them, but, um, probably less than me. So... we should talk. I'll be back on the 25th; do you want to meet me... at our- I mean, at the canal?"_

Another message from an unknown number. _"Um, this is Piper. I'm not sure if you remember me? I'm Jason's girlfriend. He- well, I was wondering if you wanted to meet up for coffee sometime. You name the place; we'll be staying a while."_

One from Annabeth. _"Please don't tell me you're drunk. I think you got liver disease, you did so much drinking last week. Anyways, I just wanted you to know that Percy and I have set a date for the wedding. It's on the 25th of May. Please call me back when you get the chance. Thanks."_

Another one from Nico. _"I'm sorry. Please pick up your phone. I'll meet you there at eight. Unless... Unless you're busy then."_

Thalia deletes all of the messages except Piper's. Then she goes in search of a gym.

:::

The burn in her muscles is familiar, uncomplicated. It's not heartache or loneliness or lust; it's from running and lifting and stretching, plain and simple. Thalia is on her third set of sit-ups when her phone rings. The other patrons give her dirty looks that she ignores.

Thalia goes into the locker room, and sits on a bench to answer the call. "Hello?"

"Thalia Grace?" Asks a cool, male voice. "I have an invitation I believe you can't pass up."

"Could I know who is extending this invitation?" Thalia is careful, but a reckless streak burns inside of her, threatening to get her into an even more terrible situation. (You were made to die)

"Oh, you'll know when the time comes. For now, though... Meet me at the Shangri-La Hotel at the lobby. Eight o'clock sharp, on January the fifth. I believe the Shangri-La is quite near you? " Whoever he is she can tell he means business.

But so does she. "And will I know who you are before then?"

"All in due time, Miss Grace." He's calculating.

"And are the odds in my favour if I decide not to honour your request?" Her life is a fine line, and really- does it matter if she dies?

"If you choose not to attend, I believe you or people close to you may find it difficult to attend anything at all afterwards." That was more straightforward than she thought it would be.

"Then I fear you leave me with little choice." Thalia is up for an easy game of chess with lives instead of pawns- this and not love is what she excels at.

"I have left you with no choice at all, you mean. Not to worry; I keep my word. " As he hangs up, she knows he keeps his word because he makes no promises at all.

:::

He shows up like he said he would, and she is still surprised and wishes she wasn't. ( _Wishes she was anyone but herself_ ) but it is too late for that now.

"Hey," He says, and there are a thousand possible next words she could say but she picks all the wrong ones.

"Listen," She grasps his arms, clutching at his biceps, yearning to feel the bones of him, to grip hard enough to bruise. ( _after all you are selfish and you hurt people and you are lethal so never forget it_ ) "I... There's something you should know."

"Okay-" ( _he is open and trusting and broken and one of these things does not sit right with the others and despite that ( **because of it** ) you don't deserve him_) "What is it?"

"It's-" Thalia swallows hard, lets herself stall a tiny bit more ( _this much don't I deserve this much?_ ) "It's the truth. But maybe you should sit down or have a drink before I tell you."

"No. No anesthesia. Just say it-" ( _promise me you won't break -please fall to pieces so I can put you back together- which pain is worse his or yours"?_ ) "-whatever it is, I'll- I can take it."

( _But will you take me can you take me?_ ) "It's about my job. " ( _he might not need anesthesia but she does- haven't you drunk enough?_ )"I ... Work for my father."

"And is he in the... Waste management business?" He raises an eyebrow; his smirk is flirtatious and deadly. (He could be just like you if you wanted him to be.)

"You mean does he have criminal activity going on in the sidelines that I'm involved in?" She's torn her heart out and wants him to (want to) take it, keep it (nothing that hasn't already happened.)

"Yes." He nods and she can't read her gaze from his- not in a deer-in-headlights, or bug-under-microscope sort of way, but because she _needs (air-food-water need)_ to know if he'll stay with her, if he (can) love(s) her, because if he doesn't - if he runs over her heart with an electric lawnmower- the she doesn't know how - doesn't think that- then this would be worse than Luke.

Worse than him (maybe-almost-twisted-ly) loving her and leaving for no reason and coming back and uprooting her life and digging up her past like dandelions and acting suspicious and oh _God_ if he doesn't say something she'll self-destruct. Thalia hates herself for letting herself to this point, to get this attached that it hurts behind a sharp pain (to the point of a dull, ubiquitous ache) to rip him out, rip her out. (Of her life, her heart.)

"I still want you. Not like I haven't done worse. " He holds her, and all her thoughts were empty before this and he fills them all with him.

"I'm not a good person." She tells him, just so he knows for sure. Thalia starts playing with the hair at the back of his neck.

"Neither am I. I guess we'll have to be not good people together, because you're stuck with me." His eyes are galaxies to explore, oceans to fall into, worlds to escape into (or from.)

Maybe she's just physically attracted to him, a warm body, and that's why it hurts so much, why she needs him to stick around. They haven't had sex- yet, she never did it with Luke but they came close- but she'd like to. She'd like for him to be (shocking, she knows) her first.

It's just that even with all the killing people and learning how to kill people crap, she never had time. And when she did have the time... She wanted, in some perverse way, to have at least the thought of being innocent, ( _one way or another pick your poison)_ to comfort her.

"Merry Christmas, Thalia." He murmurs, tilting her chin up with the slightest of touches, like a butterfly kiss it's a testament to how much he affects her, that the barest memory of a touch can make her burn.

All around them snow is falling now, and she leans in, rests her head on his chest, and wishes him, "Merry Christmas."

(he tastes like snowflakes and whiskey and regret, but that might just be her.)

:::

 ** _Please_ review!**


	12. XII

**AN:** **I'm sorry!** **Math got 100000000 times harder and then I went on vacation for two weeks with no wifi and now I'm back.**

* * *

 ** _"I don't know where you're going / But do you got room for one more troubled soul / I don't know where I'm going / But I don't think I'm going home" -Alone Together, Fall Out Boy_**

:::

 **"** Hey, Piper. What time are you free?"Thalia dials her brother's girlfriend's number three days after Christmas, partially because Annabeth had asked her to "do a thorough examination in case she turns out to be like Drew or Reyna", and really, she's curious as well.

"Is three o'clock this afternoon good for you?" the other girl asks, her voice tinny through speakerphone- Thalia is getting dressed as she talks to Piper, taking clothes off hangers and laying them on the bed.

"Yeah, I'll text you the place later, okay?" She is thinking of a sit-down coffee shop with the best French Vanilla she's ever had- and really, she's more of a black coffee, no-nonsense espresso kind of girl, but that French Vanilla is divine.

"Sure. See you there!" is Piper's cheery reply.

"Yeah. See you!" Her pantomime of a optimistic, normal person sucks. She hangs up, examines the garments strewn on her bed. A burgundy merino wool turtleneck, black skirt, and tights. She'll wear it with combat boots, her long black cashmere trench coat, and black leather gloves.

Thalia gets dressed, then texts Piper the address of the coffee shop. A few minutes later, the reply that pops up on her phone is Thanks, see you there. Opening it up to mark it as read, she decides to text Nico. _**Are**_ **_you_** **_free_** **_right_** **_now_**?

 ** _Yes_** is the answer that makes her heart jump and mouth twist into a grin.

He arrives shortly, walks with her down and says, "Hey. It's pretty close, where we're going. Fifteen, twenty-minute walk." Nico's eyes hold a jittery glint, doubtful and nervous and indecisive, above dark circles that are proof of sleepless nights.

"Okay," she answers, jamming her hands in her pockets. "You look nervous."

"Looks can be deceiving." is all he says.

"So, where are we going?" Thalia asks, looping her arm through Nico's. He presses closer to her, a silent acknowledgement of her presence.

"Somewhere I hope you like," is his cryptic reply. "You look nice."

Nico traces his eyes over her body, and she might as well be naked. She knows he's not looking at her clothes.

"Thanks. You, too," she answers, her gaze skimming over the way his dark-grey parka -not the children's snowsuit, puffy kind- hugs him, jeans and keds barely a defence against the cold, like he's hoping she'll keep him warm. "And that might have been the most mysterious answer I've ever heard. Somewhere you hope I'll like?"

"Well, it _is_ somewhere, and I _do_ hope you'll like it," he raises an eyebrow as he speaks as though daring her to challenge him.

She is neutral, curiosity and appreciation for his answer warring inside of her. "I guess we'll see."

:::

 _Something I hope you'll like_ turns out to be an apartment in a surprising size- the size of her hotel suite, only larger.

It turns out to be a one-bedroom apartment with a very comfortable couch. It turns out to be them making out on the very comfortable couch.

His mouth is on hers, not hot or insistent or needy, just comfortable and gentle and casual, like this is the first of a thousand kisses, their first life together in a thousand lifetimes.

He pulls away, shifts so that his head is resting on her shoulder, face pressed to her neck, breathing her in; just wrapped around her with her wrapped around him.

"I want to tell you something. About my past," he swallows as he speaks, and she can tell how much truth he's about to reveal. ( _Another thing to dig out of her heart, when she leaves him)_

"Okay." She won't push it, just let him tell her.

"A long time ago, I was in love with a boy." His eyes are wide, earnest ( _like roadkill before it's dead and you are the car)_. "His name was Percy Jackson, and I think you might know him. "

Her breath hisses in her throat; she realizes she's never known where her cousin went to high school. "I might- He might be my cousin."

"Okay. He- I- Percy was the captain of the swim team, and I had the biggest crush on him." ( _sounds about right_ ) "We worked on a project together, and we had a few classes together and I hung onto his every word." He laughs, bitter. "Then, at the end of junior year, he fell in love. With the exchange student from San Francisco, and when graduation came around, I never saw him again. Until that night, when I was still avoiding you, I went to the bar, and there he was, and I saw you with him, and I- all I could think was-" he is near weeping, and she wants to cry. "All I could think, was that I had only ever loved one of the people sitting at the bar, and it wasn't him." He looks at her like he's begging her, and it breaks her heart.

"Stop looking at me like that," Thalia commands, tears prickling her eyes ( _angry tears because sad ones would be pathetic_ ) "Stop looking at me like I'm going to break you. "

"But how do I know that?" His voice is angry, the sort of fury she understands. (you would know; it's self loathing and fear and hope) "Okay, how do I know you won't hurt me like every- like everyone else has? Like I'm used to being hurt- only I'm not, because it never gets better."

(His words break her, not the other way around.) "I don't know." The tears break through (everything is breaking today.) "I don't know if I won't hurt you, if I won't leave you. I just now- I only know that I don't want to. Now that I've found you, now that I know you, I don't want you to go and I don't want to leave you and it would kill me to hurt you and I might be in love with you. That's all I know. "

"That's.. That's way more than enough." His voice is all breath, like words aren't enough, or aren't necessary, because his mouth is near hers again. He kisses her, and it's hungry this time, more needy than gentle, like enough of her is not enough.

She twines herself around him, and feels the same way.

:::

"I told you, I don't have the time to take on any more cases, " Thalia grits her teeth, paces the hotel bathroom and wonders why people keep calling when she's in the shower. "No- I don't care if you have a long-lost son that's really not related to you- your brother and my father will murder me if he finds out I'm doing anything for you."

A sigh. "I don't care how much you'll pay me, Uncle Hades. This conversation is over- wait, what? You mean it?... You'll seriously deflect all conversation away from me for all Thanksgivings to come? Well, then I want a legally binding contract stating that- of course that you swear on the River Styx. What else counts?"

When she finally manages to hang up the phone on her antisocial, crazy-paranoid uncle, she's hammered out a deal. She will never have to answer the awkwardly probing question posed by one of their insane, all seeing relatives as long as she hunts down her uncle's long lost, not actual son.

She's just made a deal with the devil- or is that what Hades did?

:::

 **You guys know what sucks? When you find a bunch of views on your stories/ story, but no one tells you if they stopped reading it because it sucks, or if they think it's a good story, or if they (shockingly) love your story.**

 **Please, guys, review. Happy New Year!**


	13. XIII

_**"When you say love is a simple chemical reaction / Can't say I agree / Cause my chemical left me a beautiful disaster" -Catalyst, Anna Nalick**_

:::

By the time January rolls around, Thalia decides she probably needs a new job.

She's also made up her mind on her relationship with Nico; her New Year's resolution is to stop caring what happens between them and just let herself be loved (or whatever this is.) So far, it's working.

"Hey, you," Nico greets her, when she arrives at his apartment after slipping the key out from under the mat. "What brings you around these parts?"

He's happier these days- not exactly a ray of sunshine, but lighter. Coasting. "Now you sound like you're in a bad Western. I come bearing gifts," She tells him, showing the to-go pasta she just bought from Dal Moro's, which is around the corner from here. Taking off her dark red wool-blend coat, she hangs it on the coat rack by the door.

He laughs. "This is why I keep you around." As he speaks, he puts down the book he was reading -Anna Karenina, it appears to be- and moves over on the sofa.

"Because I buy food and bring it over? I know I should've learned how to cook," she jokes, sitting down and burrowing her cold toes into his dark-wash-denim-clad thigh.

"I don't believe you. You'd never be good at domestic things. I, on the other hand, can cook very well," He informs her with a nod.

"What? Instant ramen? Frozen pizzas?" Really, those two dishes are the extent of her repertoire, but she wouldn't be surprised if he is telling he truth about his culinary skills.

"Spaghetti and meatballs, actually. And I make a really good lasagna," Nico shifts away from her cold feet, but grabs the blanket from the end of the couch and tosses it over her. "Now stop putting your cold feet on me."

"You've left me with little choice," Thalia argues, wrapping herself in the throw. It's warm, and smells like him, all musk and citrus and boy-sweat. "Are you free tomorrow?"

"Why not tonight?" He asks, raising an eyebrow. His arm is slung over her shoulders, and she leans back against it and counts tiles in the ceiling while thinking of an answer.

"Because I have plans."

She squirms her way closer to him, sliding a hand beneath the collar of his black shirt and rubbing the skin there, feeling the muscles there ease under her touch.

Her fingers are warm from the leather gloves she deposited at the door, so he slides closer and replies,"You have plans with someone other than me?"

"Don't sound so possessive about it," Thalia teases, because while he's far from controlling, the word trust is foreign to both of them. "I'm just getting drinks with an old friend."

(Whom you don't know and probably shouldn't know and possibly might kill you.)

"Percy? Annabeth?" He knows the little details about her, some big ones too, and it rarely ceases to amaze her, how much she's let him in, how much he cares.

"No. Someone else. I won't bore you with the details. What'd you do today?" She changes the subject before he can ask too many questions or she can feel guilty- some things never change.

"Well..." he starts talking, and then they start kissing, and she can't help but have the feeling that he knows.

( _But really, her devil's advocate whispers, you can't expect him to condemn you for it, can you?_ )

:::

Her dress is red.

It's not a big deal, really; in fact, it's absurd that the only thing she registers is which colour her dress is. Thalia has worn thousands of red dresses before. ( _but never with the intention of having it be taken off._ )

The gown is clingy, with its off-the-shoulder sleeves, sweetheart neckline, and belted waist before it flares out into a bubble skirt. Her only jewelry is a simple diamond pendant on a gold chain, matching the back of her dress. It's open across the shoulder blades, the red silk connected by delicate golden threads that twinkle like starlight. Thalia's feet will be sore by the end of the evening in their shimmery Jimmy Choo T-straps, and the matching bag is a metallic clutch. Underneath the couture affair is what really matters, though; a black, almost-sheer push-up bra with lace and no straps, and the sexiest underwear she owns (both courtesy of Victoria's Secret). Over the dress is a faux fur wrap, the old-fashioned kind that movie stars in the 40s and 50s wore. Her hair is in a bun, which is held in place by a heavy ornate comb. The last thing she has to put on is her face; her eyeshadow shimmery burgundy and gold, concealer for her dark circles from endless sleepless nights leading up to this equally insomniac one, her lipstick plum-red-fuschia.

He's early, but she finished getting ready quickly, knowing the ways of him _(more than she wants to know is how much she has to know_ ). "Are you ready to go?"

His arm is extended; any passerby might think it's an invitation but she knows better ( _it's a trap_ ). "Of course." Thalia tells him, using her free hand to fidget with the clasp of her stole, with her elaborate updo, with the strap of her bag.

"Nervous?" His eyes are wide, too much to be sincere, like he's been practicing human expressions and hasn't quite mastered compassion yet. ( _isn't that true though_ )

"A little." Her smile is less fake than his; she lets this be a competition so she can act like she's winning, feel like she's winning. "It's a big deal, you know?"

"Naturally. I wouldn't blame you." His blonde hair is gelled back; she can smell the pomade he uses, the same one he used back in New York. "I've missed you, you know."

Thalia laughs a little, flirts the way she always does ( _like a bad habit_ ). "Who wouldn't?"

"I can't think of a single person. The only question I have is, did you miss _me_?" She could look at his smile all day and never think that it was a human one; it is all teeth like a shark's or gleaming rows of knives or anything lethal ( _perfect for you_ _then_ ).

"With looks like that? How I couldn't is a better question." And he is nothing short of perfection; a walking Armani ad, nothing out of place, nothing terribly ugly, nothing wrong with him ( _on the outside but on the inside he is nothing but evil_ ).

"You're too kind." His grin tears at her like the weapon it is.

"Remind me, this charity auction is for what again?" She knows it perfectly; she just hopes it'll make him stop smiling.

He does as she hoped it would ( _now if only other things were that easily fulfilled_ ). "For World Vision. They're a Christian organization, I think."

"That's nice." They are silent the rest of the way to the hotel; she shivers against the wind that whips against her bare legs. Thalia thinks of what she has to do; wonders how much information she can get out of him before she kills him.

( _Wonders if he'll kill her first, if it would really be that terrible, dying_.)

:::

The champagne is one of the few highlights of the evening.

The presentation is actually fairly interesting; in-depth, comprehensive, enough not-bad but not-that-good jokes.

The other people are dull society matrons, struggling with their Botoxed expressions and catty gossip; or thin waifs of socialites dangling like their diamond earrings off the arms of equally (but preferably richer) men.

Luke is painful.

His jokes are painful, his smile is painful, his words are painful; to be around him is like her very life is ebbing out. Okay, maybe that's a little dramatic.

Being around him... he's her past. She thought he was dead. But like some famous (dead) guy once said, the past isn't dead. It isn't even past.

"Your glass is getting empty," ( _speak of the devil_ ) says Luke, appearing with a fresh flute of champagne. She'd much rather have whiskey, Scotch, bourbon, something deeper and richer and not so bubbly, polite, staid. She would much rather her evening be takeout food and a kiss on the couch; sweats and feet tossed on Nico's lap; the rhythm of conversation coupled with drink lulling her to sleep on his sofa. Not this; not champagne and crystal; small talk and scandal; the touch of Luke's hand unwelcome on her back- Luke's company unwelcome anywhere near her.

Not Luke. Not Luke at all.

:::

 **THANK YOU TO MeganAnnabethJackson, randomer11, and Guest for reviewing!**

 **Please comment. :)**


	14. XIV

**A/N: This chapter contains a little M-rated content. Be warned! Nothing overly graphic, I think. ;p**

* * *

 _ **"I gotta tell you the truth / I'm full of broken pieces / And all my nights are sleepless" - I Don't Wanna Go To Bed, Simple Plan, ft. Nelly**_

* * *

:::

"Could you tell me what you're doing here, in Venice of all places?" Thalia wonders, her drawling ennui false. "Well?"

Luke sighs. "You'll know soon en-"

"No! Don't you dare tell me that I'll know soon enough- don't you dare come here after you left me years ago, after you left us years ago, because you were too scared for your sorry hide. We were together Luke, and you ruined that. Now, I'm over you, so why are you back? Are you the one leaking information from the company?" This is breaking a thousand kinds of protocol, shattering a million different rules but she doesn't care because she is _so tired_ of being used. She was born for a purpose, in the way that a gun is made to fire bullets, the way a knife's blade and point are shaped for lacerations, stabbings, impalings.

"You'll know soon enough. You will. Just wait and see," He walks away as he says this, his sentence trailing off into the air behind him like smoke. She downs the rest of her champagne and decides to leave.

:::

The sky is dark when she leaves.

(By herself. Luke had left her for a waif-like socialite with the looks of that of Shae in _Game of Thrones._ )

For once, its colour doesn't suit her mood- she is numb, empty, looking for (a certain someone) to fill her up; pour himself into every crack and fissure of her dark, dark soul.

The elevator ride is far longer than she would like it to be; her body thrums with electricity and anticipation, something she might even dare call _love_.

By the time she's in her room, she's half-changed. Stripping off makeup and hairpins and zippers, yanking off thousand-dollar heels and tossing away designer handbags and pulling on sweatpants with the soft gray shirt she stole from Nico on their first (quasi-semi?) date, Then, she calls the guy whose top she's wearing, and _demands_ (she's only putting voice to her body's thoughts, really) that he come over. Oh, and bring condoms.

Then she hangs up, laughing and flopping onto the bed, ridiculously glad that she remembered to keep her sexy underwear on.

"Did you invite me over to have sex?" he asks, showing up bearing the things she'd asked for.

"No, I called you over so I could watch you jack off- If you keep asking such stupid questions, we _won't_ have sex."

He steps forward as he speaks. "That could be pretty hot, though. You watching me jack off... to you." By the time he's done talking, his lips are against hers, demanding and hot and soft. Unusually soon, they reach the bedroom, half-dressed, Nico's hand wanders beneath her shirt, finds her bra, and his teeth wedge her lower lip between them before pulling away. "Damn," he murmurs, working her top off all the way. " _Damn_ , Thalia."

"Like what you see?" His gaze is searing intensity, and his words only add fuel to the flame. "'Cause I bought it for you."

"That's one hell of a late Christmas present," he informs her, with his lips pressed to her shoulder, hands skimming over the lace of her bra, undoing its clasp.

"Mm," she answers, then groans when his mouth -all teeth and tongue- finds her breast, his tongue tracing around her nipple. "I think that - _oh_ \- we shouldn't talk anymore."

Nico complies.

:::

When he's about to tear open a condom, her phone rings.

Thalia groans in protest at the loud sound, wishes it would go away, knows it won't. She rolls away from him to grab her phone from the nightstand. It's Piper, the screen reads. She swipes to answer. "Piper, this isn't really a good time..." Nico's fingers close around her ankle, wandering up her calf before pulling her back to him, and she shrieks, laughing. "Can I - _gasp_ \- call you back later?"

"Actually, it's Jason." Her brother answers, and she flushes, the goosebumps that had appeared on her arms vanishing.

"Oh," she swallows hard. "Okay, Jason, what is it?"

"There's an emergency. I need you to drive me somewhere." There's an urgency in his tone that doesn't register to her, in her sex-deprived state.

"What kind of emergency- medical? How long should it take?" All thoughts of a lovely night in (bed) dissipate like perfume, and she feels bad when she sighs heavily into the phone. ( _you should you evil person you_ )

"I can't tell you right now, okay?" Jason snaps, using his _don't-you-mess-with-me-just-do-what-i-say_ voice, and she knows from years of experience that it's either that voice or tears.

"Okay. Be there in ten." She hangs up.

"So you call me over to have sex and we don't even get to have sex?" A masculine arm encloses her waist,. "Some guys would call you a tease."

"Sorry," she apologizes, shifting away from Nico and all thoughts of their ruined evening. "I - my brother needs me. It's an emergency."

"Is everything okay?" He frowns, murmuring the question _very_ close to her ear, nose skimming her pulse point and breath ghosting her jaw.

"Um..." she grabs her sweatpants from the floor, and throws them off without underwear. "He didn't say."

Thalia grabs her t-shirt and a sports bra from the closet. He asks,"Call you later?"

"Sure." She is worried, and should be- is it Luke, did he hurt Jason? Is this what he meant by _you'll know soon enough_? "Sorry."

"Don't worry about it. I'll wait here, then?"

She leaves without giving him an answer.


	15. XV

**THANK YOU SO MUCH TO** BooksandSunsets, Guest, **and** LittleRedRidingHood70 **for reviewing!**

* * *

 _ **"Don't you wonder / Why it's always been this way / All our innocence is gone" -Wonder, Jack Savoretti**_

 **~xXx~**

"What have you been doing?" is Jason's first greeting to her when he sees her on his doorstep.

Thalia lets herself in, shoving the door open (like his jaw) and kicking off her boots. As with the last time she was here, the apartment is scarce in people and furniture; she plops down onto the couch and hugs the lone pillow to her chest. "I don't think you want to hear the answer to that question. But if you're referring to the _bruise_ , it wasn't from a fistfight."

She laughs at the look on her brother's face as he says, "Ew, _gross_."

"Where's Piper? What's the emergency?" Thalia changes the subject to get rid of the mieu of disgust on Jason's face.

"Piper's at the hospital already," He tells her, his look of revulsion making way for something darker, heavier. "Leo's been hurt."

 **~xXx~**

"You blew up a microwave, Leo, you are _not_ fine!" snaps Piper, insistent and angry and _per_ sistent as a pitbull. "Tell him he's not fine, Jason."

"Um... You're not fine," mutters Jason, not making eye contact as his girlfriend glares first at Leo, then at Jason. He fingers the wad of euros in his pocket, left there by Thalia, feeling guilty yet not at all remorseful; he would backstab Zeus any day. _Your own father_ , some people might say, shaking their heads in disgust. Y _our_ _ **own**_ _father._

But every time he thought about his childhood, he saw only Thalia. His older sister, shielding him as angry yells shook the room, audible even through the penthouse walls. Thalia, making a grilled cheese for their dinner on the one night a week their housekeeper was off, their voices echoing in the chrome-and-glass state of the art monstrosity of a kitchen. The taste of cold metal and blood as gentle hands removed the stapler from his mouth, his father's voice harsh, reprimanding him for playing in his office. Her voice murmuring, _go on, get out of here_ , as Zeus Grace reminded them once again, that _nothing_ was ever good enough for him. His and Thalia's childhoods were floating on a shipwreck, being battered by the tides and tantrums of their father's anger.

"Jason," Leo's voice jerked him out of his upsetting memories. "Jase, you gotta tell your girlfriend that she can't pay for my hospital bills, even if Beauty Queen's dad _is_ a movie star. It's unbecoming for a man. And I am the manliest one out of the three of us."

"Man, you know I can't do that, and that you're not very manly. Just tell her-" Jason was interrupted by Piper appearing in the doorway, looking stunning even in a sweater and jeans, her hair down instead of in one of her usual intricate feathered hairstyles.

"Beauty Queen! we were just talking about you, and how whipped Jason is! Do join us," Leo cracks a grin, beckoning from the hospital bed.

Piper offers no acknowledgement of her friend's words; instead, she says matter-of-factly, "I signed all the forms, Repair Boy. The doctor says you're free to go, but you'll have to take it easy for the next few days, so don't go blowing up anything else. And by the way, don't you _dare_ say something about how emasculated you feel by me paying for your damned hospital bills, leo. Just buy the next round of drinks when we get out of here."

"But I can go, right?" Leo asks, swinging his feet off of the hospital cot and onto the floor, and offering the toy car he'd made out of drinking straws and tubes to a child who had wandered over at some point during Piper's rant.

It was Jason who answered. "Yeah. Let's go home, guys."

 **~xXx~**

Thalia stretches, yawns, marvels in the fact that there is another set of tangled limbs to extricate hers from. She pulls herself out of bed, still in the clothes she wore to take Jason to the hospital.

facing the bed, she rearranges the blankets around Nico to fill her empty space, warmth still lingering there- and then her wrist is caught in a vice grip, his fingers -the ones that had cleaved to her skin, made her moan in pleasure not so long ago- surely leaving marks. ( _you might bruise easily but you don't back down quite as fast_ ) He twists, savagely, hard enough to snap it. Thanking all her years of training, she jerks her hand back, and stares in horror.

He didn't even wake up.

 **~xXx~**

What is he, ex-Secret Service? In the military? An ex-assasin, like her, sent from a rival company?

Only one thing is certain, the one thing she's ever known: _trust no one_.

Picking up a towel, she places it onto the rack, and steps into the shower with a sigh. The water is a welcome relief to her sticky skin and sore muscles, easing her body- but hardly her mind. _Maybe you're wrong_ , Thalia thinks. Maybe he's just another ex-drug-addict who sleeps with a knife, who lived on the streets. She adjusts the water temperature, turning it up so that steam further clouds the glass.

"Hey," a voice says, making her tense. "Can I join you, or do I have to wait my turn?"

Thalia looks over, hiding her discoloured wrist by wreathing it in soap suds. "Sure."

"How'd you sleep?" Nico asks her, eyes sleep-bleary. ( _like you didn't just try to break my wrist_ ) He takes the cake of shotel soap from her,l skates the bar between her breasts, and suddenly, despite everything, despite years and years and years of _don't trust anyone_ and _the whole world could be out to get you_ , her body betrays her. Shower water is not the only thing getting her wet.

"Badly," she lies. ( _two can play at this game_ ) ( _why does it need to be a game?_ ) ( _why do you care?_ ) "You?"

"Oh, fine. Very, very well." Nico is still holding the soap, and he traces it over her shoulders, trailing suds over her slick skin. He's standing in the spray now, her back cold against the glass of the shower wall, her head tilted to look at him, and she decides that it doesn't matter what either of them are, as long as they're together.

Stepping closer to her, he carefully puts down the soap and kisses her. It's a deep full kiss, every part of him pressing against every part of her, her hands in his hair, his on the backs of her thighs, lifting them up around his waist.

"Please," Thalia murmurs, nipping his earlobe, and rubbing her hips against his. He's hard against her, and the water is unbearably hot to match her. Desire coils in her, makes her fit herself more comfortably against him, put his hands on her breasts.

A sound like sigh and moan and whisper escapes his mouth, and he says, "We don't have any-"

"You're clean, and I'm on the pill-oh," The last word out of her mouth is one of appreciation for the tricks his tongue is playing on her skin.

"Okay," Nico enters her, and she bites down on his shoulder in pain, in pleasure, tastes shower water and sweat on him. His fingers burrow into her hips, and he kisses her neck like he's trying to sweeten the hurt ( _like he knows what she is_ ) The pain dissipates and she sighs as he thrusts into her, takes her teeth off of his skin and kisses him sloppily.

The shower wall is cold, but it's warm in his arms.

 **~xXx~**

"Uncle Hades," Jason greets his relative, flabbergasted. It may be early morning, the idea of caffeine in his system a faraway dream thin as a spider's web, but he's pretty sure he didn't imagine Hades of all people showing up on his doorstep. "What a surprise."

"Jason," the older man replies warily. "Could you tell me _why_ your sister isn't answering my calls?"

"Er, I don't know, sir. Is there a message I can pass on, or a reason you'd be calling her?" The intensity of Hades' piercing gaze reminds him of all the reasons he _didn't_ go home for the holidays.

His uncle has already whipped out a phone and began dialing. suddenly, the sound of Piper's voice, muted through the closed door to the loft makes him turn. as he presses his ear to the door, he hears a phone ringing, and the thud and crash of Piper, either in a fluffy blue bathrobe or her Hello Kitty pajamas, bumping into what sounds like the entry table's legs.

"Hey, Jason, your sister left her phone here- Oh, am I interrupting something?" says Piper, sticking her head out the door.

"No," Hades smiles, oily. "No, I believe we were just about done."

* * *

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	16. XVI

**A/N: I'm so sorry this is so late but fanfiction . net wasn't working so...**

 **With much annoyance and hope that you'll enjoy this...**

 **VOILA!**

* * *

 _ **"My neck, the feeling of your soft lips / Illuminated in the light / Bouncing off the exit signs / I missed" -Drive, Halsey**_

:::

Thalia misses New York.

Or rather, she misses driving.

Big cities, or highways, or racetracks, none of it matters as long as it has miles and stretches and swaths of pavement to race on, speed on, engine purring beneath her, the smell of leather and exhaust and the warmth of sun or heated seat.

Venice is nothing like New York.

Part of that is why she came here, why she jumped so excitedly at her father's assignment- to forget whatever vestiges of Luke were buried inside her, in the city, in her memory. But instead of escaping him, she thinks wryly, she ran right into him. Maybe she should just track down Luke and kill him and get the hell out of this quaint, waterlogged masterpiece of a European tourist trap. She understands the appeal of small towns, sleepy little places with the same old people, but cars, driving, floor the gas and over the speed limits and zero to sixty acceleration are things she loved and still loves.

That's not it though- The thing is, she has no idea who she loves.

It used to be simple, love. It used to be taking care of Jason, keeping him away from their father's temper, making sure he was happy and safe and that he knew that no matter how screwed-up their parents were with their inability to love either of them, Thalia loved him more than enough for it to matter. People she loved used to be only her family, Percy and Jason and Annabeth the only people she needed, the only ones she trusted not to leave her.

The only ones that wouldn't leave her because she was constantly leaving them, constantly kicking up dust behind her and chasing the limitless horizon. She did it to avoid the feeling of betrayal that worried at her every so often when she thought of Luke and his disappearance and the ways that he had taken her proffered out like a coward, left without her wanting him to- because she had just been about to love him, had been on the edge of falling and when he had left she'd turned the other way and never looked back. She'd been nearly off that cliff, and his disappearance had sent her screeching back, a sharp, sharp turn, 180 away from ever falling in love.

She was constantly jet setting around the world for the sake of appeasing her father, the desperate bids for parental praise mingled with wanderlust, the idea that if she keeps moving, keeps pulling up her roots just as they get settled, she'll be able to avoid being dug up and thrown out by someone that isn't her. That was the idea wasn't it? That hurting yourself hurt less than being hurt by someone else?

She is pretty damn sure she'll figure that out soon.

:::

Her hair is in a towel, the rest of her bare, free to be touched and kissed and lulled into forgetting the dark parts of him, the dark parts of her. To forget.

Nico is equally nude, and she cannot say she minds as he kisses her, his touch firm as if to anchor her here, keep her from leaving the bed ( _as if she could even think about going_ ) ( _but you could and would and should_ ) _(i thought we were past this_ ) ( _just shut up and enjoy the sex_ )

The interplay of his skin on hers, her lips on his, is not how she thought sex would be. How she thought her first time would be. once upon a time, she thought it would be Luke, and candle light and champagne and roses and gentle touch (even though now she knows he is nothing but gentle). Later, she thought she'd cast off her virginity on a mission, where nothing meant anything and the world was her stage, where sex was a ploy, a bargaining chip, not the follow-up to a white dress and a walk down the aisle. More recently, she thought it'd be a drunken one-night stand whose name she'd never know. Now, though, now she's just glad, so... so privileged, that it was this him and his fine hands and smooth voice and all of him so beautiful it aches and his name doesn't quite do him justice.

She is so, overwhelmingly glad, that her virginity was taken by Nico di Angelo.

( _The fly in the ointment though, her one and only problem, is that he's Nico di Angelo. The same Nico who is the reason her arm is bruised and the reason she sometimes can't sleep when everything but her mind is exhausted because she's pretty damn sure and pretty damn terrified that he's Hades' ex-stepson._ )

:::

"You haven't answered any of my calls," is the first thing out of Hades Grace's mouth when Thalia opens the door, her hair dishevelled and wrapped in one of the hotel's waffle robes.

"I wasn't aware of your burning desire to contact me," she answers, quick as a whip from years of acting, playing parts. (playing a murderer)

"I need to know what dirt you have dug up on my stepson," he demands, solemn as always. Solemn, but firm.

"I'll give you an entire case file if you come back at a better time," Thalia bargains. "Now please leave."

"No respect for your elders- did your father raise you at all?" Hades tut-tuts, curling his lip. She is suddenly reminded of the food critic in Ratatouille.

"No, he didn't. But I believe you knew that." She drips ice from her voice. Drips acid.

"Thalia?" asks Nico. "Hey, come back to bed."

Her face burns. This is the worst time possible for him to have woken up. "Uh, I'll be back. Just someone to talk to. You know these door-to-door salesmen."

"Thalia, you're in a hotel, there are no door-to-door salesmen." He sounds a little like he's laughing at her. She wouldn't blame him.

"Please go to bed," she tells him. He must listen, because she hears his footsteps fade into the hallway.

"The boyfriend, hmm?" Hades raises an eyebrow. "You know who he is, though, and you're keeping it from me."

"I don't know what you're talking about. Why would I go back on our deal? I keep my word." She knows exactly what he's talking about and wishes she didn't.

"You were always a good liar, Thalia. Just not good enough." He smiles, oily, and she wonders how he knew her room number before realizing that money is just as good as knowledge. "Tell me the truth. Your father isn't the only ruthless one in the family."

"You think I don't know that?" ( _you think I don't know I'm just as heartless?_ ) "I do keep my promises, Hades. He is... whoever you think he is. I don't know what you want to do with him, or to him, but leave me out of it. Do you think that's possible?" Her words are crisp, carved out of ice, molded from snow, frozen over so many times it hurts just to touch them.

"I do believe that's possible, yes." Hades Grace leaves as silently as he came. Thalia crumples to the floor in relief, staying there for a moment before she crawls back into bed.

 **:::**

 **A/N: Thank you to LittleRedRidingHood70 and Guest for being so supportive and reviewing! Maybe next time there could be more of you? Just a friendly suggestion. :)**


	17. XVII

***I AM TYPING THIS WITH NO SARCASM AT ALL AS SINCERELY AS POSSIBLE.***

 **Allow me to point something out. On the last chapter of this story, there are 46 views so far. There are also 2, numero dos, deux, reviews. Now, this ratio of Views to Reviews being 46:2 doesn't make sense to me.**

 **Do you have a version of Fanfiction dot net that doesn't allow you to review? Will someone murder you if you review? Are you so impossibly busy with life that you only skimmed over the chapter, closed your browser, and never thought about the story again? Is my story _My Immortal_ bad?**

 **Okay, I hate to sound nagging. I am nagging. Please don't be offended by this. By all means, take no note of this and go back to your life normally. Is it because I never update? I feel like this is a breakup and I'm asking you why we're breaking up.**

 **What did I do?**

* * *

 _ **"Destroy the middle / It's a waste of time /**_ _ **From the perfect start / To the finish line** **" - Youth, Daughter**_

* * *

Nico is silent.

He has been, since she opened her mouth.

It's not as if he's very chatty to begin with, but Thalia has grown used to lulls of silence, waves lapping at a shore with occasional sentences, words, touches to fill the quietness. This absolute stillness, no movement at all but his breaths, evenly spaced, and the heartbeat she can see between his collarbones, jutting out like wings. as if his pulse is a creature about to take flight from his body, terrifies her.

Maybe the first words out of her mouth shouldn't have been, "Your mother didn't marry your father, she cheated on him and had you."

He then said, "What are you trying to do, Thalia?" He was not irritated; there was no bite to his words, only a blunt, forceful, weariness.

Like they are the same, both knowing exactly how pointless emotion is ( _but wanting it anyways, on her part_ ) when you're speaking to someone you don't like, and she knows without a doubt that she is not his favourite person right now. Good Lord, she has not missed how complicated relationships are.

"I'm _trying_ to tell you the truth," she replies, her words just as sparse, the syllables and inflections of the English language sounding foreign to her, hollow as the facade of her home life, devoid of anger or sarcasm or any of her typical masks. Bare, and vulnerable, and terrifyingly so.

"Is that so?" He raises an eyebrow, strides over to her purposefully. Some little part of her is grateful that he didn't laugh, didn't laugh that bitter, half-caustic laugh at her, as he's done with so many things. It would be corrosive, acid thrown at her Teflon heart.

She wonders how she ever missed that he was just like her in his movements, the same graceful, agent, on-a-mission-to-destroy, sole-focus walk that she has all the time. Sometimes, he has the look in his eyes, the steely determination to shut out everything except one detail, one moment, one word. ( _but for her it's one victim_ ) She wonders who trained him. Wonders what he was before he met her, if they would've been friends. Hope springs eternal, and she hopes they would've been.

"Your father is _not_ who you thought he is. You ought to hope so, because otherwise you just slept with your cousin."

This gets his attention. She's proud, in the basest parts of her, to have one-upped him.

Nico blanches. " _What_?"

"I think it's best if you let him explain."

:::

"Hello, Nico."

It is impossible for her to reconcile this man, whom she typically sees in the shadows of some benefit gala hiding with a tumbler of vodka, or writing checks that her father slides over mahogany desks to say, _This includes the non-disclosure agreement you need to sign_ , to some lucky sucker who was in the right place at the wrong time, or cracking his knuckles to beckon his hired guns, being so gentle.

His voice is soft, without a trace of his typical rudeness -it runs in the family- and his face is composed. Not set in an angry way, all the lines of his face are knife-blades, or the exaggeration, caricature of human behaviour he is when he's drunk, but calm. Hopeful, almost.

" _Padre_ \- Hades." Nico swallows; she can see it, his Adam's apple bobbing in his throat, and it tells her that it's been a while since he's been on a mission, because he would not have this many tells otherwise. "I- What are you doing here?"

"I-" Hades begins, but it's clear his not-son has no need for an answer. It's almost hilarious, really, watching this, her usually stoic uncle falter and be interrupted.

"Why, after all these years, did you finally come now? After your damn _wife_ , and Bianca, who was most _definitely_ your daughter, _died_?" There are sparks now, like seeing Hades is a poker in the fireplace of his anger. "Why wait until everyone was dead, except _me_ , when I was most _definitely_ ** _not_ ** your son?"

"You know _nothing_." Hades seems to have recovered his composure. "You are just a _boy_ , who has _no_ idea of anything, least of all what _I_ do, the _things_ I have done to keep you, your sister, and your mother safe. I have given up _everything_ for you. I have left you for _you_."

" _No_ , you have no idea. I was starving! I lived on the streets, I was dying! Bianca actually died! My mother, the woman you must have loved at some point or another, _died_!" He looks like he might cry, like it is impossible for him to see anything in front of him but pain. It hurts her. She has caused him this pain, has dragged his past to the door, into his life, where it has hurt him.

"Stop!" Thalia interrupts.

Nico looks at her. "Whose side are you on?" He looks more hurt than he did when he was shouting at her uncle. The look on his face is a dagger, but she is bulletproof when enough pain pushes her to be.

"I am on _your_ side, you angry Neanderthal, you." Thalia crosses her arms across her chest.

"Do not think that shoving enough tragedy into my face will mean that you have suffered more than I have. We have _all_ suffered. Why don't you ask your girlfriend, Nico, why don't you ask her what she's done?" Hades is cruel, the way all of them are, when the Graces are in enough agony.

( _and you are a Grace through and through, just like your father_ )

She has never gone into specifics with him, of what she does. For all he knows, she might deal drugs. She has never gone into specifics, and for all she knows, it might ruin them.


	18. XVIII

**Thank you to** **LittleRedRidinghood70** **, krazy. khik. noelle** **,** **and** **BooksandSunsets** **for reviewing!**

:::

 ** _"Right, before your eyes / I'm breaking / No past, nowhere to hide / Just you and me" - The Last Time, Taylor Swift ft. Gary Lightbody_**

:::

"I... I'll tell you. I owe you that much, at least," Thalia says. They are back at stage one, have come full circle to silence, on his end, and she wants desperately for it to be on hers. But like she said. She needs him to know.

To her chagrin, Nico laughs. A shocked laugh, fortunately, no trace of bitterness, but pure awe, a gasp more than a chuckle. "You- you _owe_ me?" He leans forward, elbows on knees, face nearer hers. "Thalia, I... You gave me the _truth_. You gave me a way out, of all these lies and tragedies, and you have given me _everything_. Before I met you... _God_ , before I met you I was dying, I was floundering in the dark, trying to figure out if there was a point to existing when everyone that loved me was _dead_ , and I didn't know how to love someone ever again."

She is shocked; she is the surprised one, the one who sucks in a sharp breath and lets out tears. What hurts her so much, is that it will _kill_ him to learn what she does. The truth will set you free, they say, but they are too right. If she tells the truth, it will sever all their bonds, free his heart and hers too, but no one has ever said that freedom means pain, means sacrifice, means tearing apart. " _Nico_."

"I care. I care about what you do, I want to know who you are, I care because I want to know how... how you became so amazing, so impossibly good." He is _lying_ , he has to be, because there is nothing about her that is innately good, not when she was bred for destruction, when everyone around her is collateral damage. He can't be real, he can't be honest, because how can he exist? How can he exist and love her without conditions, without knowledge of her darkest secrets?

Nico goes on. "I want to know how you could possibly love me when I am so _broken_ , when I am so fucked-up, and if you don't feel the same way- If you don't feel the same way I get it-"

Thalia pulls in another breath, lets fall more tears, has to remind herself to keep breathing because he has turned her upside down, pulled her life inside out with a handful of pretty words that are more than pretty words judging by the conviction, utter force of will pressing these syllables into her mind, begging for them to imprint on her like he can't imagine that she is anything but wonderful when she knows herself that _she_ is nothing but broken, fucked-up. "Nico, Nico _stop_. How can you- How can you say these things when you don't know who I _am_ , what I've _done_? I have hurt people, Nico, I have torn them apart, I have _ended them_ , and I have _loved it_. I have _wanted_ to wreck lives and hurt things and break things and destroy people- My father- My father created me to kill people, Nico, I was made to be a weapon, I am a fucking nuclear _hand grenade_ going off _all the time_. If you are broken, it's because I _broke_ you."

He looks stricken. Looks, for the first time while his gaze is on her, _betrayed_. "No." Denial paints his words, gives him a mask, but it's not one she's familiar with, preferring to face the harsh, cruel realities of life head-on. She doesn't know him, but he knows her. He knows her so well, he might as well be dead already, because that's what happens to people who know about her, those who know about her when she isn't who they thought she was.

"No, you're a person in a terrible, _awful_ situation who made the best of it. You have done horrendous things, made impossible choices, but they do not define you. Thalia, believe me, Thalia, look at me. Thalia, you have done things, but they are over. You can't do anything about what you've done, so stop punishing yourself. _Stop_ , Thalia. Thalia, _look at me_." He forces her gaze to his. Presses his fingers to her jaw, his words to her mind, his lips to hers in the briefest of kisses. The next words he rushes out with a breath. "We are _both_ broken. Do you know, that sometimes I want to break you, want to watch you fall apart just so I can be the one to pick up the pieces? Do you know that sometimes, I want to leave you, just to see if you'll miss me? Sometimes, I want to hurt you, to see how much more effectively you can hurt me. And sometimes..."

His voice drops. She finishes his sentence. "Sometimes, I want to use you. Sometimes, I want to use you to block out the past, and pretend that nothing exists except the way you kiss me and touch me and fuck me. Is that what you were going to say? Because that's what I was."

"Can we do that now?" Nico's voice is a whisper against her skin, as gossamer-thin as the lace bra she's wearing, as delicate as something that demands to be ripped off.

"Why not?" is her only good answer of the day.

:::

* * *

"I love you," comes a murmur, barely a movement of the lips brushing her shoulder. "I'm not saying it because I want to get into your pants, and I don't want you to say it back if you don't mean it. I just want you to know. You don't have to do anything with it, except keep it and look at it, and hear it when things get bad, but... just hold onto it, okay?"

She is pretending to be asleep, and doesn't stiffen because she's pretty sure he'd know something's up. There is still something she needs to know, though, something pricking at the back of her mind. "Nico... Who hired you?"

"What?" He jumps a little, his body moving away from hers. "What are you talking about?"

"You're ex- _something,"_ Thalia clarifies. "So, what is it? CIA, FBI, hired assassin trained from a very young age? Do tell."

He sits up, sheets falling to his waist, and she does the same, hugging her knees to her chest. "Ladies first," He says, and he might just be the enemy, but she loves him for it.

"The third one. Come on now, don't keep me in suspense," she prompts.

He sighs. "What is this, truth or dare?"

"Stalling's rude." Thalia is a dog with a bone.

"I... worked for Kronos."

( _now, she wonders why she only falls for men who work for the other side_ )

"How'd you get out?" He has to have either powerful connections, or serious dirt and a retinue of heavily armed guards.

"Does it matter?" means it does.

"No," she answers.

( _and it won't, when she's done digging up everyone Hades has ever talked to and every reason he left his "son"_ )

She uses him this time, uses him to distract herself from her foolishness, from her complete ignorance now that she's fallen for the enemy, to block out all thoughts but one:

 _Thank God he doesn't know what Zeus Grace used me to do_.

:::

 **Ah, the girls of PJO! Guy declares his love for you, and you ask what spy company they're working for. Or is that just Thalia**?

 **Thank you guys so much for reading and reviewing! I really appreciate it. :)**

 **Please let me know what you think in the review box below.**


	19. XIX

**A/N: Thank you so much to** Gabbe **for reviewing! I'll try to bring in everything you requested, but the Percabeth wedding will take some time... I hope you'll stick with me! :)**

 **I have no idea about hacking, so forgive me.**

 **Read on.**

:::

 _ **"Tear me to passionate strips / Stir up the beast inside" - Until It Hurts, Francisca Hall**_

:::

Thalia is on a manhunt.

Digging through Hades' files (after bribing his secretary, doorman, security guard, and housekeeper to never utter a word of her visit to her uncle's office, disabling the security cameras and putting them on a loop, then throwing out the surgical gloves used to do it) to find what she wants is a lot harder than she thought it would be. She'll admit; she's a little rusty.

( _if you did more work for me, you wouldn't be_ , hisses her father's voice)

For one thing, he has half of them on paper and the other half in a state-of-the-art, password-and-firewall-and-FBI-style-protected software. She's running de-encryption programs while rummaging through his filing cabinets, pulling out anything that says _di Angelo_ , _Kronos_ (the ringleader of Luke's gang, The Titans, who she recalls Hades doing business for, and frankly, so she can say she's doing work), or _Luke Castellan_.

So far, she has a handful of files and a half-empty hard drive. The manila folders are in various states of disrepair; some are yellowed, others coffee-stained, and one of them looks like it was halfway inside a paper shredder before Hades changed his mind. Clearly, he was trying to make them out to contain insignificant data.

All of them have one thing in common though: they all hold papers that bear the insignia of a rose wrapped around an angel, holding a dagger. Seeing as they all mention _di Angelos_ she has to assume it's something akin to a family crest.

Everything on the USB so far relates to more than just the one PR job Hades did for The Titans; no, there are _decades_ of history here, going back to 1985, when Hades would have been 25. There's even a picture of him at that age, a grainy grad-school picture of him with an honest-to-God _afro_. And what looks like the beginnings of a _soul patch_ , incredibly incongruous to the skull-and-crossbones tattoo inked on his left shoulder.

Who _is_ this guy?

:::

Just as she's about to pack up her findings and retreat to the safety of her hotel room to find out, her phone rings. Scrambling to pull it out of her ridiculously tight jeans pocket (seriously, why on earth did women's clothing have such inconvenient storage?), Thalia swipes to answer when the screen shows ANNABETH CHASE calling.

"Hey, Annabeth," she says to her oldest friend, not sure what to expect.

Tucking the folders into her messenger bag and the flash drive onto a long necklace chain that was hidden beneath her loose sweater, she listens to her friend's rant. "Athena is being _impossible_. Even Percy's mom is better than her! Good Lord, I bet I'm the only bride to ever love her mother-in-law more than she loves her own mother."

"That bad, huh?" Truth be told, Thalia is only half paying attention to Annabeth, all her attention being focussed on getting out of here as quickly as possible.

She takes the stairs quickly, pulling up the hood of her jacket (elevator security cams were much harder to avoid, and there was also the risk of running into someone) and zips up her nondescript coat, wedging the iPhone between shoulder and ear as her friend's voice, pitched high and high- _spirited_.

"And honestly, it's like it's _her_ wedding! I get that she and Dad eloped in Vegas or whatever, but it doesn't give her the right to pick out my bridesmaid dresses, and the effing _veil_ that I wear. I mean, in twenty years, will any of this really matter?" Annabeth scoffs.

"Yeah, in twenty years I'll look at the pictures and think, gee, if only Annabeth had picked out a better bridesmaid dress for me, and if only I was holding a better-looking champagne flute," Thalia chimes in playfully.

"Actually, oh! Champagne! That's why I'm here- in Venice, I mean." Her friend sounds more harried than usual, but she brushes it off. Running your own architecture firm at twenty-four is difficult, stressful, at best, and while planning a wedding with your much-hated mother? She doesn't envy her. "I mean, for the wine. We're actually in Italy to pick out some freaking _wine_. Can you believe it?"

"That's ridiculous." Her answer is short, autopilot as she gets on a boat, the usual form of transport in Venice. "Hey, I'll have to call you back. I need to go somewhere."

"Yeah, sure-" Annabeth says just as Thalia hangs up.

:::

"Thalia?" Annabeth repeats, before taking the phone away from her ear and looking at the screen. CALL ENDED, it informs her. She huffs.

"Hey, Wise Girl," Percy says, using the old nickname. His voice, by now, is as familiar to her as her own. "Thalia?"

"Yep. She just hung up on me," she admits, looking out the hotel window at the traffic below. As always, her eyes are drawn to the little architectural details of the hotel across from them, the texture of the brick and placement of the arched windows. It reminds her of the brownstones back in New York. "Hey, would you ever want to-"

"No," Percy says straightaway. "We are not getting a cat. Dogs only."

She sighs. "You didn't even hear what I had to say. And what's so bad about cats? They are low-maintenance pets. I was going to ask if you would ever want to move into a brownstone."

Her fiancé frowns. "What's a brownstone? Also, dogs are fun. Cats just scratch you and want to be left alone. And I already know one person that does that."

"Hey!" Annabeth retorts. "That is not nice."

"You said it, not me," Percy teases, eyes dancing with mischief. "I only opened the door for you to walk into, you stick in the mud."

"Take it back!" Annabeth snaps. "I am not a stick in the mud. Or a wet blanket."

"Yes, you are," Percy tells her. "And I love you, but I'm not taking it back."

"Take it back, or no sex for a week," she negotiates. "Do it."

"No," he states firmly. "I won't."

"Take it back, or I'll leave you out of the wedding cake tastings-"

"That's fine, I don't want to spend any more time with your mother than I have to," Percy counters.

"You interrupted me. I'll leave you out of the wedding cake tastings, make sure the cake is not blue, and up the no sex to a month." She should've been a lawyer, Annabeth thinks as she watches Percy concede.

"Fine," he mumbles. "Kiss?"

"Kiss." It's her turn to give in, as she presses her mouth to his, and keeps it there.

:::

"Hey!" Thalia says to Annabeth as she finally picks up. (After five rings. It took three calls.) "Um, are you alone? And is this a secure line?"

"No, and yes," she answers, sounding slightly out of breath. "Percy, can you… Go get dressed?"

"Oh, my- oh, gross! Annabeth, how could you subject me to thinking about images of my cousin's naked butt?" Thalia says indignantly when she realizes why her friend sounds so… Off. "Or even worse, images of you two doing it?"

"No one is doing it!" There is the rustle of what must be bed sheets, and she imagines Annabeth pulling up the blankets to cover herself, sitting up in bed, then shudders.

"Anymore," Thalia interjects. "Anyways, there's something you should know."

"What is it?" Her friend sounds so innocuous, so safely happy, that she doesn't want to spoil it. But she does anyways.

( _She's always ruining people's lives, isn't she?_ )

And after the blonde hears the news, it seems she is.

"What?" Her voice sounds so different, even though that same word is one she uttered just moments before. "What do you mean- why would he be there?"

"I don't know," Thalia admits. "But I'm going to have to find out."

:::

"I'm going over," Annabeth tells Percy, sticking her head into the bathroom where he's showering.

"Okay, see you at dinner?" He asks, voice muffled by water. "Unless you want to join me…"

"I'm good. I might stay long, so don't wait up." Adrenaline is humming through her veins, and what no one remembers is that she is just as dangerous as Thalia, all the brutality but half as dark.

She's just glad she already drank today.

 **Review, please, lovely lovely people! And have a nice day.**


	20. XX

**Thank you so much to** BlackRaven **for adding me and this story to your favourites! And of course thank you to** SoManyThingsSoLittleSpace **for reviewing! Severe writer's block is no excuse, but I hope you'll forgive me (in a lovely review, if possible?)**

 **Now on with the story.**

* * *

 _ **"Screaming, crying, perfect storm / I can make all the tables turn" -Blank Space, Taylor Swift**_

:::

"Thank you for meeting me" are the first words out of Thalia's mouth, and all Annabeth can think is that they signify danger, disaster having unfolded, aftermath and fallout and triage. It's the kind of thing people say after deaths, injuries. After fights and arguments and uncertain hovering between chaos and peace.

"Of course," Annabeth replies. She looks around the lavish suite, drops her laptop bag onto an armchair, joins Thalia on the edge of the bed. "Mind telling me why I was summoned?"

She plays at playful, pointlessly tries to lighten the mood when she knows it's heading towards trainwreck, when she knows there will be destruction to follow.

"Luke is back," Thalia answers. "He's back, and do you know who _did_ work for him?"

For once, she doesn't. For once, her encyclopedic mind has failed her, finding it impossible to put even a guess of a name to reply. "No, I don't."

" _Hades_." Fists clench, Thalia's black-painted nails glossy against the skin of her palms. Annabeth's own fingers dig into her hands too, and she finds herself looking for a fight to pick, as she breathes in, like this bland hotel room smell is the odor of stale beer and sweat, like she and Thalia still wear combat boots more often than heels, like this is a bar with someone ripe for the beating-up.

" _Hades_? As in, your uncle, the one who does all the enforcing and threatening and coercing money out of your dad's business partners?" She feels her eyes widen.

"The very same." Thalia's smile is cutting, sardonic, looking for a target. "Oh, and my boyfriend is Hades' long-lost stepson, so, surprise! Technically I've committed incest."

"Do you have any other bombs to drop before we get to work on whatever it is I came here for?" She breathes shakily, unsettled.

""Lucky for us, no." Her friend uncurls her fingers from her palm, revealing raw, crescent-shaped indents. "Now help me start plotting."

:::

By the time it's _very_ late into the night after seven shots of espresso between them, they finally have a plan.

Maybe it's the late hour, the caffeine affecting her already over wired brain, but she finds herself wondering how she got here.

How did she get here, from her awful, screwed up life, to an even more awful, overcomplicated life? She's making plans and plotting and scheming and right back in her father's trap; she's right back where she was when Luke was alive, but Luke isn't alive. Nico is.

Thalia wasn't supposed to meet Nico. She wasn't supposed to fall in love. She wasn't supposed to want to stay.

She was supposed to get in, get out, and be back to New York before anyone knew she'd left. But then again, her life was never as expected.

"Thalia?" Annabeth's voice makes her blink, the brief burst of darkness soothing to her tired eyes. She holds then shut. "Thalia, there's someone at the door."

"What?" The espresso shots are beginning to wear off, and fatigue seeps into her like warmth from a hot bath. "Um, hide the stuff!"

"Okay." The blonde complies, efficiently clearing off the espresso containers into the trash, stuffing the files and Annabeth's own laptop into her laptop bag and hiding Thalia's under the pillow.

Meanwhile, Thalia reluctantly answers the door, peering through the tiny warped disk of glass to find...

Nico. Everything is okay now, everything is a thousand times more complicated now, now that he's shown up, and she minds so much and she doesn't regret it at all.

She lets him in, introduces him to Annabeth and makes up a story about helping her friend with wedding planning in an insomnia-fuelled daze. She collapses on the same bed that she plotted against him in, and laughs as he pulls her close, kissing down her neck. She acts like all is right with the world and maybe for him it is but all she can think is that it's about to come crashing down, and she's the cause of it that.

She doesn't, for a single second, suspect him of being just as awful as she is.

:::

He offers her a smoke, and it's everything like it was when they first met, and everything better.

( _and everything worse_ , whispers the guilt forming in her stomach)

The guilt presses at her, clawing its way into her throat, temporarily paralyzing her vocal cords. Thalia swallows. "Thanks," she says, playing along. "Trying to quit, though."

Nico gifts her a lazy grin to go with the cigarette, plays his part perfectly with the line "Aren't we all."

She inhales, takes a long, deep drag, feeling the rush of the drug filling her lungs, can imagine it unfurl like a flag, some invader landing on a foreign planet, claiming it as their own, and she watches him thinking that it might not be so bad. Then she imagines it, expanding like an explosion's mushroom cloud, and shudders.

They stand (not sit, she notes, and they aren't on the canal but her hotel room's balcony) as they watch drifts of smoke disappear into the equally pale sky, the overcast suiting her mood. Hinting at something ominous, but wavering; the little glimmer of hope, the silver lining, the _maybe it's not going to be so bad after all_ showing up in the fact that the clouds are lighter than heavy storm clouds, lighter than the _cumulonimbus_.

( _she should know better than to **hope** , by now_)

* * *

 **For another chapter... 3 reviews.**

 **Have a nice day! :D**


	21. XXI

**So sorry for the wait!**

 **5 reviews? Two more than requested? I love you guys!**

 **Thanks to:** **Gabbe** **,** **SoManyThingsSoLittleSpace** **, Krazy. Khik ****.noelle.** **, reading-is-4-life, and SaBurritoReads for reviewing!**

* * *

 _ **"Just gonna stand there and watch me burn / But that's alright because I like the way it hurts" —Love The Way You Lie, Rihanna and Eminem**_

"No, she's asleep" are the first words Thalia hears when she wakes up, and she knows from years of experience that they mean nothing good.

They're Nico's words, followed by the muffled crackle of a voice on the phone. All she can tell is that it's a male voice, vaguely familiar.

She presses her eyes shut, trying to pick out the conversation as it moves away from the bedroom. Welcomes the darkness to hide her demons, push away her fears.

"I don't want your money," he speaks firmly, his statement harshened by the heavy sigh he lets out. "That was the past. This - this is my future."

 _Hades?_ She wonders.

"I don't care - you know what? Fuck off. Oh, you want - You know what, you can shove that up your ass along with your damn head, because if you think I'm doing anything for you - well, you're dead wrong."

A sharp thud as she imagines the phone slamming down onto a table. Shuffling noises - pacing, she guesses? - and then silence. She imagines him running a hand through already-disheveled hair.

"Who was that?" Thalia yawns, stretches and feigns just-woke-up grogginess. "Hades?"

"How much of that did you hear?" He frowns, brows furrowing together.

"Just the part with the swearing," she answers, lies, puts her arms around his neck, forehead against his. "Why?"

"No reason." He presses his lips to hers, quick and hard, seals the lie in. "Yeah, that was Hades. We kind of... Fought."

"I'm sorry." She doesn't know what she's apologizing for - only that she'll have to.

"Don't be." He pulls her close, chin resting on the crown of her head. "It's not your fault."

"But I brought him into your life, and now—" she's interrupted by him, pressing his mouts to hers.

Nico falls onto the bed, bringing her down with him. He's kissing her neck, lips parting from her skin just long enough to tell her, "Enough talking for this morning."

She can't say she disagrees. Even if, for reasons unknown, her thoughts turn to Luke, and the voice on the phone. HIs kiss seals her doubts in, but they are still there - curiosity burning through her, suspicion locked up inside of her like blood in a wound that's been cauterized.

:::

Guilt used to be his default emotion.

It's one he thought he'd turned off a long time ago, when he left his life of drug-induced highs and kill-induced lows, when he left the blood and poison and alcohol - but apparently, guilt has stayed.

It's burning a hole in him right now, holding his thoughts hostage, refusing to do anything but taunt him.

It's a brand that won't stop aching, a wound that won't stop throbbing, as he kisses Thalia, presses her lips to his, drowns out the pain with pleasure.

It's the fact that mercenary is a word he used to call himself, and no one knows that except his girlfriend's bastard of an ex (whose voice still rings in his ears long after Nico has hung up the phone.

"Fuck, don't stop." Thalia, nails down his back and bite marks in his shoulder and a tangle of black hair matching his own - they are the same, and he will not say anything of his plans because that is how he survived, with incessant paranoia. And he imagines - he knows she is the same way. She is a murderer, and his hands on her skin could just as easily hurt her as they could caress, but if they're on a downward spiral he's dragging her down with him.

"I won't. Promise." And it is the only promise he'll keep today, to drown himself in her, to bury himself in her, to block out the world because it will remind him of himself, all the pain, the world that wants to hurt both of them - and the world is him, really. It is pain and betrayal and lies and death.

He kisses her, and his eyes fall shut, and he drowns the pain in pleasure, but that doesn't mean it's disappeared.

It just means she's his new drug. Thalia is the high he's chasing, her and her sharp wit and bitter tongue and eyes that match his, hands and mouth and voice that seek his. She's a new ocean to drown in - but the old one will always call him back.

:::

Luke doesn't know why he cares.

He doesn't know why he keeps tabs on all of them, long after he's joined the Titans, long after he's been branded with their gang's tattoo (a letter K, golden and surrounded by flame. He's never asked what it stood for.) Thalia is the same as ever, blindly believing that once a killer, never a killer again, when she should know better. By now she should know that once you opened the darkness inside you, all you could do was keep it from swallowing you whole. You couldn't act like it would go away; you could feed the monsters inside you, but you could never slay them.

And that, he supposes, is where they disagreed. She thought she could save him. He knew they were both broken - and she was as dark as he was.

Then there's Annabeth, who is fine now, normal now, although recently he's seen her sucked back into the vortex, the gaping black hole, the potential supernova of a girl that he has always known and still loves, that is Thalia Grace. She's happy with Percy, normal and successful and acting like her demons won't catch up to her - and they won't, as long as she runs fast enough. But one day, she'll break, she'll slow, she'll fall the way Thalia will - and Luke will be right there, waiting for them.

* * *

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	22. XXII

_"I'm a broken man / Help me breathe / If I've lost my heart / Bring it back to me" - Bring it Back To Me, Martin Luke Brown_

Thalia finds, waking up, that all her dreams have been nightmares - because all her dreams were memories.

"...but don't you ever want to leave sometimes?"

Thalia is drunk, seated in a seedy bar in Queens, where her blue-streaked hair, nose ring, and ripped jeans only serve to cloak her in anonymity. Luke is next to her, black hood pulled low over his face, tattered running shoes on his feet, a beer in his hand. He frowns at the words she has just spoken.

"Yeah, of course I do. Run away with you, start over. I dream about that all the time." Luke looks at her, his words and gaze making her heady as any alcohol would.

"Why don't you?" She'd been so innocent back then, so ready to trust him, to believe that all he wanted from her was love. She'd been wrong; he wanted power, tears, pain.

"I love it too much," he answers with a grin. "Don't you?":

And then the red stuff in her glass is not wine, it is blood; she is red-handed, she is a cold-blooded murderer. She has killed - and she has loved it.

It always comes back to that.

She wakes gasping, drowning, reaching for air and cursing herself for it, for wanting to live when so many people have not, when there are corpses piled up at her feet - when she has killed. She doesn't deserve the simple luxury of oxygen.

When she can breathe again, Thalia notes that the bed is empty - only rumpled sheets bearing warmth and scent remain on the mattress. She gets up, wrapping a hotel waffle robe around her shoulders - one she stole and took to Nico's apartment, where she is now. Padding quietly to the small kitchen, she finds Nico, his back to her, facing the small slice of moonlight coming in through the part in the curtains. Reaching out, Thalia touches his shoulder, and regrets it.

He latches onto her wrist, but she is quicker, and judo-flips him, a trick Annabeth taught her. Her knees are straddling his hips, and the entire time his eyes remain shut, moonlight still pouring in as though her world, so newly formed, hasn't shattered into a thousand glittering shards. Finally, when she has both his hands in a death grip, Thalia sees his eyes open.

"I know who you are," Nico whispers. "Killer."

When he's said the words, she expects - what? The impossible, to wake up from some nightmare? Life has never been so kind, and why should it be? She's done the worst things imaginable, and some unimaginable, so why should Nico be any different?

Why should he love her? Why should he stay with her? Why should he want her?

Why should she get to keep him, when she has mercilessly torn away countless others from those who loved them? Why does she deserve anything, a single scrap of happiness, a fraction of what Annabeth has with Percy?

She's done with being a good person. She's done with love, and hope, and joy, and faith.

Those are for people who haven't killed.

:::

Thalia flees his apartment after knocking him out cold, and leaves behind no trace of her - takes her underwear, the one toothbrush, the lone pair of jeans, her flip flops, the box of rubbers she'd bought with her credit card. When she gets back to the hotel, she packs all of his stuff into one of the hotel laundry bags, puts his name on it, and leaves it outside the door. She clears his contact information from her phone. She's scrubbed out any mark of him from her life, any sign of her from his apartment but still - she can't get him out of her heart.

But she tries - oh, she tries. She drinks, she shops with Annabeth for a wedding dress, she skypes Percy, she investigates Luke, she investigates Hades again, and the entire time, she's wondering if she's crazy for wishing that his fingers had left bruises, that the housekeeping had left his aroma on the sheets, that he'd left his name tattooed over her heart - because that is exactly what she feels like, like he is some drug she'd injected, like he is under her skin and she cannot get him out.

He's a tattoo that scarred, a needle that went too deep, leaking poison, poison she shouldn't want, poison she asks for more of.

:::

The stranger thrusts into her, moaning dirty things, things she should use to erase any thought of Nico from her mind. Instead, all it does is make her think about how this guy's hair is not black as she thought it was in the club, but instead a very deep brown; how he is thinner than Nico was, skin and bones in an addict sort of way. His apartment smells like cigarettes, but they fell out of his pocket and they're a different brand from the ones he offered her. How does she manage to feel lonely in such an intimate act?

The guy's breathing speeds up; she hears all the too-familiar signs of orgasm, and fakes a groan, clutches at him, whispers yes, yes, just like that, oh. It's just one more thing, when the stranger rolls to the side, and she gasps, pretends she enjoyed it, that reminds her of Nico di Angelo, and the fact that he didn't talk dirty. He just knew all the ways to please, to touch, to kiss - his mouth was often too occupied to talk dirty, so she'd do it to him.

When the daylight hits her the next morning, accompanied by a hangover, Thalia doesn't feel clean. She doesn't feel rid of him.

She just feels dirty. She doesn't even know this guy's name, or maybe she's forgotten it, and alcohol feels like it's never left her system, much like Nico. Nothing about this feels right. Standing in the rain, teardrops and raindrops alike dripping down her face, a short skirt letting her bare legs be hit by the cold and damp, it just makes her feel lonely.


	23. XXIII

_**"I'm doing it with my own heart / I won't let it mend / Use my own two hands / I rip out all the seams" - Lost, Liza Anne**_

Loneliness.

It's a gnawing, gaping, ever-expanding hole where her heart used to be.

It's when she watches an old western, vultures circling. ( _but you're already bones picked clean by him, he tore the flesh from your frame when you pulled free_ )

It's the overwhelming, heavy wave of disappointment that rushes over her when a car pulls up in front of the hotel, a car that isn't Nico's.

THe Audi is her best friend's, asking if she'll take tea with her.

"You're not being yourself," Annabeth tells her over high tea - like a bunch of brainless socialites or old biddies, Thalia notes, numb and raw with it.

"If myself means _in a relationship with a guy who can only hurt m_ e, then yes, I agree." She tosses out the information recklessly, carelessly, like that doesn't feel like tearing out her heart - the only thing left of her.

"Oh, Thalia." Annabeth puts a hand to her mouth, and the ring-bedecked one on Thalia's, squeezing firmly.

Thalia jerks away. She doesn't want pity, not from the girl who's always known who she loveds and has always loved a good guy. "I'm fine. Let's just have some frigging crumpets or scones or whatever you have at high tea. Just… don't talk about it."

"Or the wedding," she adds, when Annabeth opens her mouth to speak.

The blonde frowns. "I was going to call for brandy."

"And then you were going to say something about your mother, which would lead to complaining about her domineering ways, and afterwards you'd say something about how much she hates Percy, and then talk about the wedding."

Annabeth frowns. "I'm not that bad."

When Thalia stays silent, her friend glowers at her. "No! I am not that predictable, am I?"

"Well, you see, in your old age…" Thalia quips, settling back into the routine of their friendship, having missed her best friend.

"Oh, stop it! I'm younger than you!" Annabeth laughs. "But don't change the subject."

"What are you talking about?" Usually, it's an unspoken rule between them that they avoid whatever subject one of them doesn't want to touch on.

"You've been shacking up with this guy for a month now! What happened?" Annabeth's blatant words would make her blush if she were anyone else.

"I said I don't want to talk about it," she snaps, but adds, "The mission comes first. You know that."

"Not for you it doesn't," The blonde counters. "You - You really thought you were gonna be together."

Her soft tone can almost lure Thalia into talking, but she knows that's a snare she doesn't want to be caught in. "No, I didn't. I thought we were going to have a good time, but then it turned out that escaping the past is damn near impossible when you have Luke on your tail."

"What?" Her friend's grey eyes widen. "Thalia, why didn't you - "

"I didn't want to worry you." A heavy sigh, air expelled. If only she could do the same to her demons. "You were- you're going to be happy, Annabeth, you're going to have a normal life, with a guy who is in love with you and would never try to hurt you or leave you or break you."

"I'm strong enough," Annabeth stiffens, steels herself, chin up, shoulders back. "I'm not a little girl anymore."

"I know." The brandy arrives almost silently, borne on a platter by a handsome waiter with gold eyes. Gold? An odd colour. "I know, but it's not just - I don't want you to have to worry about me, not with Luke back."

"You never told me why he left," Annabeth prods, but Thalia's closed up, has spilled enough truth for the day.

"Another time," she says, and this time, she concedes.

:::

 _"Where are you going?" Thalia walked in to see Luke's back, his hair a mess, his hands shaking as they stuff a balled-up handful of t-shifts and jeans into a duffel bag._

 _The room is small, sparsely furnished like all the rooms that Zeus Grace allows his agents. Only a pinned picture of her, and Luke and Annabeth decorates the small space. A bed, neatly made with dark blue sheets, and a plain beige dresser with matching nightstand, take up most of the square footage._

 _He doesn't answer. "Luke?" She tries again, because back then Thalia believed in something called hope. "Answer me."_

 _"I'm getting out of here, Thalia. And if you were smart, you would do the same." He keeps shoving things into the bag, the world keeps turning, and she's not quite sure how she keeps breathing, because the world has just disintegrated beneath her feet._

 _"Why?" They were going to be together. Have a life together. He can't leave. He can't walk out on their plans - only that's exactly what he's doing._

 _"Sorry, babe." He gives her a half-remorseful smirk, a false grin. Bile rises in her throat. Babe? "Someone offered me more money."_

 _And how could she forget, really, that Luke Castellan always comes first to Luke Castellan?_

 **so sorry for this late update, happy holidays to everyone!**


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